Topic: I am underage and having extreme difficulty buying Bitcoin. Help a kid out! - page 3. (Read 549 times)

I got scammed.

But first, let me start from the beginning. Since most of the people recommended getting a parent/guardian or a person who is over 18 involved I manned up and approached the only adult I knew who might be ok with helping me out. My pitch went well and he was cool with the idea. We began the process of setting up a account on his name on Coinbase. I had no idea it was such a painstaking process, hence I had told him that it will be quick. I felt bad... I looked like I had not thought this process through and I was misleading. It took us about 2 hours to get to a point where Coinbase asked him to make a 8 second video of himself holding up his credit card to his face and read a script. I could tell he was not comfortable with it and I was not comfortable with it also. We tried Kraken also, but it soon became evident that we would end up in the same spot. Anyway... I looked like I did not know what I was doing so I had to apologize and abort the whole plan. I was frustrated. Bollocks.

Then became friday (22.12). When I got up I saw that bitcoins and all the altcoins were tanking. I got excited. This was my chance! A great time to buy and to get on board. Against all of the recommendations and my own better judgement I decided to find a local dealer and opt for a face-to-face deal. I found one on facebook and we set up a meeting in a hotel lobby. It was a 2 hour adventure for me to get to the hotel. There was two guys waiting for me. I introduced myself, we shook hands and started with the business. One guy scanned my QR code with his Ipad and told me to hand over the cash. I did. It looked like he had sent the bitcoins my way. They said that due to heavy traffic the transaction time was 30min to 1h (I had also read about long transaction times and it sounded logical). I made the mistake of not demanding that we wait together for the transfer to hit my wallet before I handed over my money. I asked if they could wait with me but they refused. My pleading did not work. They left.

Since the whole deal was pretty intense for me I sat there looking into infinity for the next 5 minutes. I started my journey back home refreshing my wallet every 30 seconds. By the time I was home it was clear there was no payment coming. I was and still am mortified.

Looking back they looked tense. It looked like one guy was telling the other guy what to do. It did not feel right, but I felt like I was already in too deep to abort... Maybe they would get pissed if I told them that I changed my mind. Also everything happened pretty quickly.

Thanks for all the suggestions. There are some expensive options with a few places with high fees but I guess I have no choice. I will give an update on how things went down.

i dont see a problem. why should be exchanging some pocket money from one currency into another a problem?

bitcoinkid_yo: if you can get your money into some online payment system, it would be probably easier for you to geet into crypto.; costs would be higher though

or you can ask someone >18 you know and trust to buy crypto for you (cousin, uncle, friend, older brother.. whatever :p )

1) Get a bank account
2) create a wallet in a secure way (learn how to do it properly and safely, this is the single most important thing)
3) Go to local bitcoins or whatever your country's equivalent is. Buy bitcoin with your bank account.
4) Use decentralised exchanges, like Waves, or anonimous ones, like ETHdelta. Do not go to exchanges, which require verification, and always be on the lookout for it, because, as underage, you're screwed, once they ask you for ID, they'll keep your money.

And NO, doing cash for Bitcoin transaction IS a bad idea.
You can find a way to do it.

Good luck!

Use gift cards at localbitcoin

Im going all in.         Ok just kidding.

Yes it's virwox that was a little typo on my behalf but it's fixed now. Good luck with the two sites I recommended, you should be at risk using either of them. Just make sure your guardian is aware of what you're doing and never spend more money than you can afford to lose.

Afaik you could buy a couple hundred dollars on any exchanges but your withdrawal is only limited to a certain amount every day, and that is without verification (or maybe they've changed that?). The suggestion of purse.io and virwox are actually decent though you need to pay for fees and rates that are quite high. Never do meetups on LBC or any other platform as you're risking yourself out considering you're underage. Good luck! I want to say you ask your parents out but it isn't an option for you.


it is virwox.

Thanks will look into the options. Did you mean virwox.com or viewox?

It's pretty hard to get into bitcoin as a teenager but it's not impossible. I will have to say this, the options I'm about to mention are not really ideal they will charge a lot of fees or you are not buying bitcoin at a market rate (slightly higher). So what you first of all can do is head over to purse.io and start doing orders. What purse does is that it allows people who are looking to buy things on Amazon with bitcoin. The two downsides of this is that you're buying above market rate and you will have to wait a couple of days until the parcel has arrived before you get your bitcoins. But except that it's great for underage people. The second site you could use is virwox. Thus site allows you to instantly buy bitcoin via PayPal or another payment method they accept. The downside of this is that they charge a lot of fees and you can only buy a certain amount every single day. Hope this helps.

Thanks for the reply`s all! Asking my guardian is out of the question. To do a face-to-face buy/sell I would have to travel quite a bit. I did try to buy from a facebook group but had to abort. Looking back I am 90% shore I almost got scammed. Decent sellers with high reputation want to see ID even through facebook. There is a bitcoin ATM in a nearby city but it is located in a pawnshop and one would need ID before using it. Any other ideas?

Thanks for the reply but asking my parents is out of the question.

You will need your parents to register on an exchange. Assuming you're in USA, try Poloniex. Don't invest a lot and be ready to lose ALL the money. Good luck!

I think it's better to buy bitcoin when the guardian knows it, after all that will keep you from some of the risks. Reduce the loss caused by price fluctuations.But if you are powerful enough, you can convince your parents to help you.Listen to the advice your parents gave you

I have my bank account since I was 16 year old. But they requires parents permission to open account.
Having a bank account can't guarantee that you will be able to buy btc. On many exchanges you will need to pass verification, and if you under 18, they may to not verify you. So, you need to use exchange which don't requires ID verification.
Or if you can't open bank account, ask your parents for a help.

That's what I was wondering too.  I mean ... A teenager can have a checking and savings account with a bank right?  I'm pretty certain I had both before I was 18, but my parents may have had to be involved in helping get them set up.

A cash deal would work but is selling BTC to a kid legal?
Kid would kinda risk getting jacked..

Sounds not very good, but probably only way. Only way you can skip your parents here is localbitcoins. Its also risky as underage, because someone can trick you into beliving he sent u bitcoins. Choose only sellers with huge trust.

Have your parents help you.

Hi, Does anyone here have any experience of overcoming this issue. The amount I want to park in bitcoin and maybe other altcoins is not big but also not small.

Help a kid out!