Do cash buyers pay more? The average cash sale was £20,074 lower
open for offer is the pre-market: you can find out what your home is worth, and whether buyers are there, before it is ever advertised.
No. In England the average home that sold without a mortgage went for £279,238 in July 2026, against £299,312 for one bought with a mortgage. That is £20,074 lower, on HM Land Registry's UK House Price Index. A cash buyer is a statement about certainty and speed. It is not a statement about price.
open for offer is the pre-market, the market that exists before a property is ever advertised. This piece is for owners in England who have not listed, and who have been told that the right move is to hold out for a cash buyer.
Do cash buyers pay less than buyers with a mortgage?
They have, every year, for a decade. HM Land Registry splits every registered sale by funding status, and the rule is mechanical: "All applications with a mortgage deed, or where the mortgage deed is submitted within three months of the sale, are mortgage sales, while all those without an accompanying mortgage deed, are marked as being a cash sale." Nothing in it depends on who the buyer is, or on how the price was agreed.
| Month | Sold without a mortgage | Sold with a mortgage | Difference | Cash lower by |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2016 | £208,867 | £221,628 | £12,761 | 5.8% |
| July 2025 | £276,940 | £295,634 | £18,694 | 6.3% |
| July 2026 | £279,238 | £299,312 | £20,074 | 6.7% |
The gap has not closed in ten years. It has widened, from £12,761 to £20,074. Over the 12 months to July 2026 the cash average rose 0.8% and the mortgage average rose 1.2%. The England average across both, £293,479, sits nearer the mortgage figure, because most registered sales have a mortgage behind them.
Why the gap is not a discount
The obvious reading of that table is the wrong one. It is not evidence that the same house fetches £20,074 less from a cash buyer. It is the average of two different sets of houses, and the index records what was registered, not why. We will not guess at the reasons here.
What the table does settle is the direction. Whatever cash buyers are, as a group they do not pay the higher prices. So "I will wait for a cash buyer" is a decision about how a sale will go, not a decision that raises the number at the end of it.
How many sales are cash
More than most owners assume. In 2024, the last full year outside the index's revision window, 201,502 England sales were registered without a mortgage and 469,699 with one. Cash was 30.0% of the 671,201 registered sales whose funding status was known: roughly three in ten.
HM Land Registry is explicit about the limit of that count: "As we are not able to identify the funding status of every property transaction sales volumes for cash/mortgage may not equal the total." Three in ten is the share of the sales it could classify, not of every sale in England.
That changes what waiting means. A cash buyer is not a rare animal you hold out months to meet, because close to a third of registered sales already happen without a mortgage. The question is not whether one exists for your home. It is what you would trade away in price to have one.
What these figures cannot tell you
- July 2026 is provisional. HM Land Registry says estimates for the most recent months "are likely to be updated as more data is incorporated into the index". The August 2026 figures are published at 9.30am on 21 October 2026.
- Recent volumes are not a trend. The same release says users "should not use provisional UK HPI data volumes to infer trends in sales activity". That is why the counts above are from 2024 and not from this year.
- An average is not your house. These are national figures for England. Nothing here says what any particular buyer would pay for your home.
What this means if you own in England
- Funding is a certainty question. A buyer with no mortgage takes a lender and a valuation out of the chain. That is worth something to you. It is not the same thing as a higher price.
- Do not price for one buyer. How a single person is funding a purchase is one fact about one person. What a home is worth shows up in how many people want it.
- Start from the evidence nearest your home. That is what has sold on your street and in your postcode. HM Land Registry publishes the price paid on every completed sale in England and Wales.
Before you choose a number
open for offer holds a market estimate for addresses across England, built from the home's last recorded sale adjusted for price movement in the area since. Looking it up does not list your home. See the market estimate for your address.
An estimate tells you where the evidence points. The queue on your home's page shows how much interest there is.
Testing the market is £9.99 a month, with no minimum term.
Common questions
Do cash buyers pay less for a house?
On HM Land Registry's UK House Price Index the average England sale without a mortgage was £279,238 in July 2026, against £299,312 where there was one: £20,074, or 6.7%, lower. That is the average of two different sets of homes, not a discount on the same home.
What counts as a cash sale?
HM Land Registry marks a registered sale as cash when no mortgage deed is lodged with it, or within three months of it. Every other market-value sale is counted as a mortgage sale. The split records how the purchase was funded, nothing about who the buyer is.
What share of house sales in England are cash?
In 2024, 201,502 England sales were registered without a mortgage and 469,699 with one, so cash was 30.0% of the 671,201 registered sales whose funding status was known. HM Land Registry cannot identify the funding status of every transaction, so the two figures do not add up to the total.