Success! I Finally Sold BTC Directly to Cash in My Hands!
As some of you know from my previous post, I had two days of bad luck at the hands of the Bitcoin Exchange of Montreal due to them not having their business in order. But today it's not bad news of yet again not being able to sell some BTC for cash, as I finally got to exchange BTC for direct cash in hand! Wo0ot! Hip-hip-hooray! :)
People outside waiting to get in (after I left)
Of course, it wasn't without issues again :P
I arrived at the exchange, with someone already in, and two people waiting outside. So I got into line. Then some Frenchmen from France showed up and instead of going behind me, they go beside to wait in line. What, in France they don't do single file lines or something? You gotta line up sideways on a sidewalk and make it harder for others to walk by? Then one them kept bumping into me. Boy was I glad when I finally got into the exchange!
But like I said, it wasn't without issue. The teller behind the counter was the same person as Saturday morning. She recognize me and I asked her if everything was working for localbitcoins. She smiled, and said she had to check. I was immediately skeptical of things would work out.
Unfortunately, the teller was still having issues logging into her localbitcoins account for the business. She was trying to do a forgot password but the email was never being sent to her inbox.
Since I couldn't use the automatic exchange from localbitcoins, I ended up sending one bitcoin through the hash string manually input into the address field to send bitcoin to someone. I got the exchange to refund me the localbitcoins fee that they charge for sending outside their market. I ended up checking the hash 2 times because upon first revision I was missing a letter. My transaction was sent, and then I had to wait 20 minutes for two confirmations to be received. In the meantime, more people came in to get served while I waited.
But at long last, the teller told me there were two confirmations and that she would now prepare the cash. Yay! I got $3,000 all in $20 bills hehe, and the rest in $100s and $5s. A nice wad of cash in evelopes :)
I sold the BTC for a few dollars under the current bitcoin price, due to this being an exchange that operates as a business and they buy bitcoin's lower than the actual value, and they sell bitcoin's higher than the actual value.
At the end of the day, I think it was 4 PM, I got a message from one of the individuals I had contacted from localbitcoins read to buy some BTC at the market price. But by that time it was already over five hours too late :( He was busy becoming a dad as his child was born -- that's why he couldn't respond to me these past few days.
As for the price I sold that, it was pretty close to today's top, so at least I'm happy about that. You can see that this morning bitcoin started to rise. It went above 2575 and 2600 while I was rollerblading downtown. I'm glad I managed to catch bitcoin at its top of the day when I sold. :)
Next time I will may try to contact people outside of the weekend, as this past weekend no one responded to my attempts to sell them bitcoin when they had listings already on localbitcoins.
This was my first time doing a local meetup to get cash directly from selling BTC. I had done paypal payment before, but paypal took $60 once so I didn't want to do that again just in case ;) Cash is good. No electronic tracking of the money :) Plus selling for cash gets you more money than selling to your paypal or bank account. Most of the prices for selling BTC are higher for cash on the spot compared to digital transfers. So although the exchange gives out less than the market price, I got it in cash so that made up for it I guess ;)
Yesterday was a negative BTC selling post about my experience trying to sell for cash, but today it finally worked out.
Have you had only positive experiences in selling your bitcoin for money you can use?
I don't want to make people afraid of trying to sell BTC :P I am looking into getting a bitpay card, but they require identification. So maybe I'll stick with cash even though it's less "convenient".
Do you use cash, or only electronic forms of payment (debit, credit card, etc.)?
It feels good to cash out a little right?! In the future you might want to consider exchanging BTC for gold/silver at veldtgold.com because it's a super easy process, fair pricing and quick delivery. Then exchange the gold for cash or even better......hold the gold (depressed asset) and catch the coming gold rise for even more personal wealth down the road. Upvoted you for this post, keep good content like this coming!
I have a bit of gold and more silver. I didn't buy bitcoin at the time ($375) and instead did precious metals because they are tangible (real physical) and time tested stores of wealth. But I should have had more faith in the "magic internet money" LOL. Gold will eventually go up indeed, but the OG metals are having a hard time right now and until a small crash or "the crash" happens it wont go above the current levels they've been going around the past few years. BTC has more momentum. I wouldn't have sold some silver but at the price it's at it's too close to where I bought in and it's better to just wait. I should have sold two times already when they re-peaked, but I'm no trader. I was just planning ahead for the long put-off economic awakening, who knows when that will come... Thanks for the feedback.
Those coins can actually get cash?! Ive just been hoarding them like Scrooge mcduck.
LOL. Do you swim in imaginary bitcoins in your mind because you have so many? :P
Though there were some minor issues, at least you finally had your main goal achieved. Congrats! Thanks for documenting. Now I know why you didnt choose paypal and bank transfer. Still eons away from that but at least I have an idea of better options for encashing and why it's better.
Thanks and you're welcome, I'm glad that my personal crypto experience has value to others as well ;)
Good for you! I read the whole post just to get a sense of how these things work as I'm not yet at that stage. Spend the money wisely...or not!
I purchased a new mattress and all that jazz (pillow, protector, sheets). So far, it's been a semi-wise spending I guess :P It's the first time I will have a pillow that's wroth $150 lol (I paid -25%)
Sweet dreams then!
It's great that there are physical locations to go and sell bitcoin for cash now. Having more of those in different countries will be very convenient for international travelers.
Hopefully the process gets smoother and less issues as time goes on.
Yeah, that would help it's adoption a lot. Lack of ease and convenience makes things less appealing.
Good going, good to here that people are benefiting from this
Thanks, yeah it can be useful for people who aren't sure if bitcoin is real or how to get the spendable cash.
I'm invested in bitcoin but I'm not ready to sell I'm going to keep it because I have faith it will go higher as crypto to me is the way of the future, I try to put a little in when I have the extra money , I'm glad you finally got your cold hard cash! It was a process for you that you finally achieved. When I have enough I will do it to🙃
Yup it will go higher in time ;)
I'm patient lol😂
Well between crashing gold and silver, I prefer the more profitable bitcoin to get money from at this point hehe.
I still have people say but what is it? Can I touch it? Do you have a card for it? Lol
You finally got it done, congrat to you. I pray I find mine as easy as this when I am ready to sell...
yo will always find things easy when they are generally accepted
BTC is now a global currency
Yeah. If you live outside of a major city... good luck!
Haha always some issues, right ? I'm glad you received that much cash :O
Yah, the CAD is worth less than the USD, so I get more cash, but it's worth less ;)
Love your story of doing a cash in hand Bitcoin transaction! Good thing you got all the letters in the hash :)
Hehe thanks, yeah it's something you don't want to mess up lol.