By Mike Lentz | The Mike Lentz Team - Keller Williams Realty
In South Jersey, about one in five. Through September, 19.7 percent of 2026 home sales in our five counties closed in cash. Cash is most common at the low end of the market. Between $200,000 and $750,000, where most local homes sell, just 15.6 percent of buyers paid cash.
That’s lower than the national figure. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) put all-cash purchases at 27 percent of sales in September. In Gloucester, Camden, Burlington, Salem, and Cumberland counties, the cash share is down slightly from 21.4 percent over the same months of 2025.
The other 80 percent of buyers financed. Conventional loans covered 53.7 percent of 2026 sales, FHA 17.3 percent, and VA 5.9 percent.
Who Are the Cash Buyers in Real Estate?
NAR sorts cash buyers into three groups:
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Homeowners who sold a house and are using that money to buy their next one
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People buying a second home
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Investors
Investors get most of the attention. That first group, homeowners moving with the proceeds of a sale, may include people a lot like you.
Plenty of them feel stuck because they don’t want to give up a low mortgage rate. Once they see they may have enough equity to move and pay cash for their next home, today’s rates matter a lot less.
What Paying Cash Gets You
Buying with all cash means:
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No monthly mortgage payment
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No need to borrow at today’s mortgage rates
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No loan approval process, so you may be able to close faster
Even if your equity won’t cover the whole purchase, putting more of it toward the next home means borrowing less. That can mean a smaller monthly payment, too.
How Common Are Cash Buyers in South Jersey?
It depends on the county. Cumberland County has the lowest home prices of the five and the highest cash share. Camden and Gloucester sit at the low end.
| County | 2026 sales (Jan. to Sept.) | Paid all cash |
|---|---|---|
| Cumberland | 909 | 24.3% |
| Salem | 543 | 20.4% |
| Burlington | 3,947 | 20.0% |
| Gloucester | 2,502 | 18.9% |
| Camden | 4,076 | 18.7% |
| Five counties | 11,977 | 19.7% |
These figures cover sales recorded in Bright MLS. Some investor purchases happen privately and never reach the MLS. Some of those are cash, and others are financed with private or investor loans, so they aren’t counted here.
Price matters more than the county, though. Cash buyers are common at the very bottom of the market and much less common in the middle:
Under $100,000, almost three out of four sales closed in cash. Between $350,000 and $500,000, only 13.2 percent did. That middle range is where most South Jersey homes trade. Homes between $200,000 and $750,000 made up 84 percent of 2026 sales.
Above $1 million the cash share climbs back to about one in three. Sales at that level are rare here, though, with 196 in the first nine months of the year.
Do Cash Offers Win in South Jersey?
Not on price. Between $200,000 and $750,000, cash buyers paid 100.0 percent of the list price on average. Conventional, FHA, and VA buyers each paid about 101 percent.
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38 percent of cash purchases closed over asking, compared with 49 percent of conventional, 52 percent of FHA, and 55 percent of VA purchases.
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Financed purchases were far more likely to include seller concessions: 37 percent of conventional, 52 percent of FHA, and 51 percent of VA sales, against 20 percent of cash sales.
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Cash sales went under contract in a median of 15 days, compared with 17 for conventional buyers and 26 for FHA buyers.
For sellers, that means a cash offer is usually cleaner and sometimes faster, but rarely the highest number. Financed offers more often go over asking, and more often ask for help with closing costs. Compare offers by what you net after concessions and costs.
For buyers who need a mortgage, financing is no handicap here. In this price range, financed buyers won most of the homes that sold over asking.
Financed Buyers Can Still Make a Cash Offer
Some lenders let a financed buyer write an offer that competes like cash. AnnieMac’s Cash2Keys program is one example. The buyer still has to qualify for the mortgage, and the lender’s money backs the offer so it can drop the mortgage contingency. FHA and VA buyers are eligible.
Depending on how the purchase is structured, some of these sales close as cash and others close with the buyer’s loan. The program’s numbers aren’t published, so the MLS figures above can’t separate them out. If you’re financing and worried about losing out to cash, ask your lender whether it has a program like this before you start writing offers.
What Cash Buyers in Real Estate Mean for Your Move
If you already own a house, you may have enough equity to make your next move more affordable than you realize. If you’re buying with a mortgage, you’re in good company. About four out of five South Jersey buyers this year financed their purchase.
What’s possible for you depends on your equity, your budget, and current market conditions in your county. We can look at how much equity you have and who’s buying in your price range, so you know what your options are.
If you want to talk through what this means for your situation, schedule a quick call and we’ll walk through it together.
For the full picture in your county, see our county market reports for Camden, Burlington, Gloucester, Salem, and Cumberland counties.
