Sometimes (or often?) mortgages and financing can fall apart at the last minute, so sellers often prefer all-cash offers because they know there's virtually not

Sometimes (or often?) mortgages and financing can fall apart at the last minute, so sellers often prefer all-cash offers because they know there's virtually nothing that can make the deal fall through or drag on long. Pre-approval is usually done by different people than much stricter people who do the underwriting, so things can fall appart there, too. When I bought my last house (newly built), on the DAY OF closing, 2 hours before the closing appointment, my mortgage officer calls me to tell me I'd need to bring another $5000-ish (due to a reason I've blocked from my mind). He told me my builder would bring a check for an equivalent amount made out to me, but to make the accounting/financial all legal, we couldn't just "zero each other out". The money had to clear from both accounts. (I wish I could remember exactly the circumstances). And, this money couldn't just be a check but had to be a cashier's check that was guaranteed. It couldn't be cash, either, because it had to be from an account that the underwriters had reviewed and done money laundering screening for. Due to the logistics of that day, I had to go through herculean efforts to get that cashier's check made. I usually bank with online-only banks, and thank god that I had a local bank with just enough balance to make it all work... And that's for someone who is lucky enough to be able to bring that extra money and to be able to take the day off of work to make happen. I imagine many others wouldn't be as lucky. That closing could've been easily pushed off a couple days had this surprise made us unable to close that day. Sellers like not dealing with this, so they prefer cash offers.