‘Pretty shocking’: Man says cash offers made buying home difficult

CHARLOTTE — Terry Hill is happy to call Charlotte home.

However, it took a while to find one. When Hill decided to relocate from Washington, D.C. to the Queen City, he figured he would be a competitive buyer. But offer after offer, Hill kept losing to all-cash buyers.

“To be perfectly honest, I was like, all right, I’m transferring my job down here, but I work remotely, so I’m going to get this D.C. money and then it’ll stretch longer here in Charlotte, so I’m going to be fine,” Hill said. “It was pretty, pretty shocking.”

Hill isn’t the only one who is struggling to buy a home in the current market. Data from 2022 shows a major rise in the number of buyers coming in with cash to close deals.

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“It’s disheartening, you know, because you’re just trying to, like you said, find a home that you can raise your kids and you can be comfortable there,” Hill said.

Nelvia Bullock, Hill’s real estate agent, told Channel 9′s Genevieve Curtis that because of a low inventory of homes and a rise in relocators, more cash is being brought into the market.

“So what I’m seeing is people from those markets who are downsizing, they’ve sold their home and they come here with the sizable amount of cash,” Bullock said. “They then come to Charlotte and they bid on these houses and they have so much additional income to pad their offers.”

A lot of cash is also coming from investors, who are flooding the market. From 2017 to 2022, Charlotte saw a 52% increase in the number of all-cash buyers.

>> In the video at the top of the page, Curtis explores why some homebuyers are spending more time finding a home.

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