How a cash sale actually works, step by step

The 60-second version

A real cash buyer prices your house, signs a purchase agreement, opens title at a title company or escrow attorney, walks the property to confirm scope, and closes — usually 7 to 14 days from contract signing if the title is clean. The buyer brings a wire to closing; you sign the deed; the recorder files the deed the same day or the next. No appraisal. No financing contingency. No 6% commission. Repair scope can only move the offer up after walkthrough, not down — that's the rule we put in our contracts and the rule a serious cash buyer should be willing to put in theirs.

That's the headline. Below is what each phase actually looks like, including the parts that most cash-buyer sites won't tell you because they're either embarrassing for the buyer (the retrade window, the title-cloud tactic) or boring for the seller (title commitment, lien payoffs).

Day 0 — the offer

Before a cash buyer makes you an offer, they're doing four pieces of math at the kitchen table or behind a screen:

1. After-Repair Value (ARV). What the house will sell for on the MLS in renovated condition. They pull comps — recent closed sales, same neighborhood, same bed/bath, same square footage, renovated finishes. A good buyer reconciles an automated estimate (an AVM like RentCast, HouseCanary, or CoreLogic) against actual closed sales pulled from MLS or the county recorder. A bad buyer just trusts Zillow.
2. Repair scope. Roof, HVAC, electrical, plumbing, kitchen, bath, flooring, paint. They walk the property (or ask you point-blank) for major-system age and condition, then price the rehab against contractor pricing in your market. The HUD FHA 203(k) rehab-scope taxonomy and RSMeans construction cost data are the sources serious operators anchor against.
3. Carrying costs + buyer cushion. The buyer needs a margin between purchase price and resale to cover holding costs while they renovate (taxes, utilities, insurance, financing), selling costs when they relist (commission, closing costs), and a profit + risk buffer. The classic shorthand is the 70% rule: buyer pays 70% of ARV minus repair costs. Real-world numbers run between 65% and 78% of ARV depending on market and buyer type.
4. Speed premium and condition discount. A house in turnkey condition with no urgency on the seller's side trades much closer to retail than a fire-damaged house with a foreclosure sale on the calendar. The condition multiplier + the speed-of-close requirement set the buyer's anchor.

The output of this math is a number. On our site, you see that number first and the math underneath it. On most cash-buyer sites, you give them your phone number first and they tell you the number sometime after that, when leverage has already shifted.

Days 1–2 — the contract

Once you accept, the buyer sends a purchase agreement. What's in it:

• Purchase price. The number they offered. It should match what you saw online. If it doesn't, ask why.
• Earnest money deposit (EMD). Usually $1,000 to $5,000. This goes to a title company or escrow attorney, not to the buyer. If a buyer asks for EMD wired directly to them, that's a red flag. The point of EMD is that it's at risk if the buyer walks for a reason outside the contract — and an at-risk dollar held by the same party that might walk is no longer at risk.
• Closing date. Usually 7 to 21 days out. A serious cash buyer will name a specific date. "Closing ASAP" or "as soon as possible" is not a closing date — it's a placeholder.
• Inspection / due-diligence window. A short period (3 to 10 days is typical) where the buyer can terminate without losing EMD. This is the buyer's walkthrough opportunity. If a "fast cash" buyer attaches a 14-day inspection window, they're leaving room for a retrade. See the article on how flippers really negotiate for what that looks like.
• Assignment language. If the contract has the phrase "and/or assigns" on the buyer line, they're telling you they may assign the contract to a different end buyer. That makes them a wholesaler, not a cash buyer. Wholesaling is legal in most states within limits, but the person signing isn't the one closing — the end buyer hasn't been identified, and your closing depends on them finding one. Ask explicitly: are you the end buyer, or are you assigning? Either answer can be fine; the surprise is what kills deals.
• Attorney review (in some states). Illinois, New Jersey, parts of New York, and a handful of others run most residential transactions through attorney review — a short window (typically 5 to 10 business days after signing) where either side's attorney can modify or cancel the contract. In other states, buyer and seller each retain counsel separately or use the title company. If your state runs attorney review, get an attorney before you sign.

You should never sign anything without reading it. A legitimate cash buyer will not push back on attorney review, redlines, or a 24-hour pause to read the contract. Pushback on those things is itself useful data.

Days 3–7 — title work opens

Once the contract is signed, the buyer (or you, in some attorney-review states) opens title at a title company or escrow attorney. Title is doing four things in parallel:

• Chain of title search. The recorder's office in your county is searched for every recorded document affecting the property going back 30+ years (usually 60+). Goal: confirm the seller is the actual owner of record and find anything that could prevent transfer of clear title.
• Lien search. Mortgage liens, mechanic's liens, judgment liens, IRS or state tax liens, HOA liens, child support liens, code-enforcement liens. If anything shows up, the title company orders payoff statements and the lien gets cleared at closing out of the closing funds — not out of your pocket.
• Survey or plat review. Confirms the property boundary matches the deed and there are no encroachments across the property line.
• Title commitment. The title company issues a title insurance commitment listing every "exception" — every thing it found and what it requires before issuing a clean policy at closing. The buyer's attorney reviews this. If anything is a real problem, that's where it surfaces.

For most houses, title work runs clean and takes 5 to 10 business days. The two slow categories are inherited houses with unfiled probate documents and houses with old liens (10+ year old judgments, IRS liens, decades-old mechanic's liens). Both are routinely cleared — they just take longer. Your title officer or the buyer's attorney runs point.

Days 5–10 — the walkthrough

The buyer walks the property in person. This is not an inspection like a financed retail buyer would do (no third-party inspector). This is the buyer or their construction person confirming what they priced into their offer. They're looking at:

• Roof age and condition (from the ground or by drone in some cases).
• HVAC age and condition (look at the data plate on the furnace and condenser).
• Electrical panel (knob-and-tube, federal pacific stab-lok, aluminum branch wiring — these are the headline issues).
• Plumbing (galvanized vs copper vs PEX, water heater age, any visible water damage).
• Foundation (cracks, bowing walls, evidence of settling).
• Kitchen + bath finishes (cosmetic-only or full gut?).
• Anything you didn't disclose — and you have a duty to disclose known material defects in nearly every US state.

This is the moment where a bad cash buyer plays the retrade game: they show up with a contractor, find a list of "issues" they didn't price for, and try to drop the offer $20,000 between contract and close. Our rule, written into the contract: scope reductions move the offer up. Scope expansions inside the original tier do not move the offer down. The only scope that moves the number down is undisclosed major damage you knew about and didn't say. A serious cash buyer is willing to write that into the contract. If they aren't, that's the deal you walk away from.

Days 7–14 — closing

Closing happens at the title company or attorney's office, or by mail if you're an out-of-state seller. Remote online notarization (RON) is authorized in nearly every US state now, so flying in is rarely required. What happens at closing:

• You sign the deed (warranty deed in most states; quitclaim in some special situations).
• The buyer wires the purchase price to the title company. Title disburses: pays off your mortgage, pays off any liens, pays the buyer's closing costs they agreed to cover, and wires the net proceeds to your account — usually same day or next morning.
• The deed is recorded at the county recorder's office. This is the legal moment of transfer; the buyer owns the property the second the recorder stamps it.
• You hand over keys — at closing if you've already moved, or on a possession-after-close date you negotiated (we routinely do 7 to 30 days of free possession for sellers who need to move out after closing).

What you DON'T do on a cash sale

• You don't pay agent commission (no listing agent, no buyer agent). 5–6% of sale price stays with you.
• You don't repair anything. The buyer takes the house in its current condition.
• You don't stage, photograph, or show the house. No public listing, no Zillow, no neighbors stopping by.
• You don't pay for an inspection (the buyer's walkthrough is their problem) or an appraisal (no lender to satisfy).
• You don't deal with financing contingency. The deal can't fall apart because the buyer's lender pulled out — there's no lender.

Where this falls apart

Cash sales fall apart in three places:

1. Title issues that take real time. A missing heir on a probate house. An IRS lien larger than the equity. A judgment from a divorce that nobody filed properly. These slow the close from 14 days to 30, 60, or 90. Most are resolvable; some kill the deal.
2. The buyer was actually a wholesaler and couldn't find an end buyer. The contract had "and/or assigns" language. They've been shopping your house to their buyer list since they signed. If they don't find someone willing to pay what they committed to, they let the inspection window expire and walk away with their EMD.
3. The retrade. Buyer shows up at walkthrough with a "list" and tries to drop the price. Sometimes seller agrees because they're under time pressure; sometimes seller walks. Avoidable with a contract that forbids it.

All three are avoidable on the seller's side by reading the contract before signing and by asking the buyer the direct questions that close off the loopholes. We do this for our sellers; if you're talking to a different buyer, the article on vetting a cash buyer has the 30-minute checklist.

Compared to the retail path

If you sell through a real-estate agent on the MLS, you get a higher gross sale price (retail vs investor). You also get:

• 60–120 days on average from listing to close;
• two weeks of pre-listing prep (photos, paint, declutter, possibly minor repairs);
• an inspection contingency window where the buyer renegotiates price down (this almost always happens — see the article on inspection renegotiation);
• an appraisal contingency window where the lender's appraiser may come in below the contract price and force a second renegotiation (see appraisal gap);
• 5–6% gross commission paid out at closing, plus 1–3% of seller closing costs, depending on your state.

When you net-out the differences — gross price minus commission minus repairs minus closing costs minus carrying costs during 60–120 days on market — the gap between cash and retail closes more than most sellers expect. Sometimes it closes all the way. Sometimes it stays meaningful. The article on off-market vs MLS walks the math.