You typed four words and got a page of companies swearing they are around the corner. Some are. Some are franchises. Some are websites that never buy a house at all. Here is how to read the results you are looking at — including ours — before you give anyone your address.
A "near me" search stacks three layers, and none of them is labeled honestly. At the top sit paid ads — the companies (and lead brokers) who bid the most for your click, not the ones closest to your house. Below that, the map pack rewards whoever tuned their business profile best. The organic results underneath mix genuinely local operators with national websites wearing your city's name in the page title, assembled from a template for every city in America. Proximity in the search results is a marketing outcome, not a fact about the company. The only way to learn who you actually reached is to ask — and Part 3 gives you the exact questions.
Part 2A company that purchases houses in your metro, walks the property itself, and closes in its own name. Its advantage is real: it knows your market's repair costs and block-by-block values well enough to price confidently instead of padding the discount for blind risk.
A recognizable name whose local office or franchisee makes standardized offers. Usually professional, usually conservative — the formula protects the brand's worst-case deal, not your best case. Worth including when you compare; rarely the strongest number at the table.
A marketing operation. The form is the product: your address and phone number are forwarded, or auctioned, to investors who pay for seller leads, which is why a single submission can produce five calls from companies you never contacted. Legitimate when disclosed. Most never disclose it. Fair Home Cash is this species, disclosed: we connect sellers with independent local cash buyers, buyers pay us flat marketing fees up front whether or not a purchase ever happens, and sellers pay us nothing.
None of the three is automatically bad. But they deserve different conversations, and you cannot have the right one until you know which species answered the phone.
Part 3A direct buyer says yes and offers proof of funds. An honest connector service says no plainly, the way we do, and tells you exactly how it is paid and who will appear at closing. The operation to walk away from is the one that hedges instead of answering.
Every legitimate company can name its legal entity instantly, and that entity appears in a state's business database. An operator who will not name the entity is asking you to negotiate with a ghost.
The after-repair value, the repair budget, the costs, the margin. Companies confident in their numbers show them. Companies that quote by phone and push for a same-day signature are pricing your urgency, not your house.
You do not need local expertise to check a buyer — you need the state's own records. Every state runs a free business-entity search through its Secretary of State or corporations office: search the company's legal name, confirm it exists and stands in good standing. Then ask for proof of funds in that same entity's name, insist on the written offer with its math, and close only through a licensed title or escrow company that holds the money, clears the liens, and records the deed in one transaction. In states where sellers customarily bring attorneys to residential closings — Illinois is one — use yours; it is the cheapest insurance in the deal. The tricks this screen catches, from the closing-day price cut to deed theft, are cataloged in the scam field guide, and the two-minute entity lookup is demonstrated, on us, at is Fair Home Cash legit.
The quietest difference between the three species is what they do with your information, and almost no site tells you before the form. So here is ours, in the open: Fair Home Cash is an advertising and lead-generation service. When you request an offer through this site, we share your details with independent local cash buyers who work your market, and any written cash offer you receive comes directly from one of those buyers. Buyers pay us flat marketing fees, paid up front, for the inquiries our advertising generates, the same whether or not a purchase ever happens, and sellers pay $0: no commission, no service fee, and no charge for the walkthrough or the written offer. The privacy policy spells out the handling, and a do-not-sell mechanism is yours to invoke at any time. Hold every other form you meet to the same standard: if a site will not say what it does with your address, assume the form is the product.
Part 6Fair Home Cash is operated from Chicago, and Illinois is its home market: the walkthrough, attorney-review, and title-company process described across this site is the seller path available here, from the city itself — the street-level detail is at Chicago cash house buyers and statewide at Illinois cash house buyers — to the collar counties and downstate. Outside Illinois, the coverage map shows where we can connect homeowners with local cash buyers. And wherever you are, every check on this page applies to Fair Home Cash with no exceptions: the entity record (WealthExtract LLC) is in the Nevada Secretary of State database, and the offer formula is published, worked example included, at how offers get calculated.
Part 7Some are, some are not. The results mix three species that look identical from the search page: genuinely local investors who purchase with their own funds, national franchises whose local office makes formula offers, and lead-generation services that do not buy anything; they connect you with investors who pay flat marketing fees up front for seller inquiries. Fair Home Cash is that third kind and says so plainly. The ad position or map ranking tells you nothing about which you clicked; the questions you ask on the first call do.
Ask three questions. Are you purchasing this house yourself, with your own funds, or connecting me with someone who will? Where is your company registered, and does it appear in my state's Secretary of State business database? Will your offer arrive in writing with the math behind it? A direct buyer answers all three in one breath. An honest lead-generation service answers the first plainly, the way Fair Home Cash does; a dishonest operation stalls on the first or fails the second, because the entity on the website often does not exist where the website says it does.
For pricing, local knowledge genuinely matters: repair costs, block-by-block values, and closing customs differ enough that a buyer who knows your market can offer with confidence where a distant one pads the discount to cover blind risk. For safety, locality matters less than structure — any legitimate purchase, from anywhere, runs through a licensed title or escrow company that holds the money and records the deed. The dangerous combination is the reverse: a company that sounds local but is a call center, priced from a spreadsheet three time zones away.
Every state maintains a free business-entity search through its Secretary of State or equivalent corporations office. Search the company's legal name, confirm it exists and is in good standing, then ask for proof of funds in that same entity's name and insist the offer and its math be written down. Close only through a licensed title or escrow company — and in states where sellers customarily have attorneys at residential closings, use one. That screen works identically in all 50 states.
It depends entirely on whose form it is, and most sites never say. Behind many we-buy-houses websites, your address and phone number are forwarded or sold to investors who pay for seller leads — which is why one form can produce five phone calls. Before you submit anywhere, look for a plain statement of what the company does with your details. Ours is stated on this page and in our privacy policy: sellers pay nothing — no fees, no commissions — and our privacy policy includes a do-not-sell mechanism you can invoke at any time.
Fair Home Cash is operated from Chicago, and Illinois is its home market. Outside Illinois, the coverage map lists where Fair Home Cash can connect homeowners with local cash buyers. Wherever you are, the vetting on this page applies to Fair Home Cash the same as to anyone: the entity record (WealthExtract LLC) is in the Nevada Secretary of State database, and the offer math is published.
Our entity is in the state database, the offer math is published, and, if the property is a fit, any offer you receive arrives in writing, directly from a local buyer, with your attorney welcome from the first page. Sellers pay $0.
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