Is there a way I could get ripped off with a cash purchase for my house?

Wire transfer is the safest for you, if it happens before you sign over title to the house. Make sure there are witnesses at the bank to the wire transfer. Get them to sign a letter of witness that has the date and time. Make sure you have witnesses to your signing over the title. Make them sign a letter of witness with the date and time.

Get a lawyer if the fees are worthwhile to give you better peace of mind.

Do not take paper cash money directly from the buyer -- it may be counterfeit bills. [With a wire transfer, the transferring bank bears the risk of counterfeit bills if you are in good faith and with no knowledge of the fraud].

Lawyers can mess up transactions by suggesting delays and complications.

If you are getting all cash, and you are not giving warranties that are too extensive, most of the risk is on the buyer's side. I assume the realtor has done a title search and that your title is 100% valid and unquestioned. I assume that you are not giving the buyer extensive warranties about the environmental conditions of the ground, or the working repair conditions of the plumbing or the roof, or the composition of materials in the house. You should be very careful about giving such warranties. If the buyer starts raising questions like that, then transfer title to the house and ground "as is" (possibly at a slightly lower cash price). Make sure the buyer takes all these risks.

Your risk as recipient of a wire transfer is nil as long as it is properly witnessed at your bank's end. Once the money is logged into your account, nothing else matters (except if you gave improvident warranties which could later become expensive to honor).

If you get a lawyer, get a realty specialist that will give you a fixed package of services for a fixed fee. Do not get a lawyer that wants to go on the clock, and make you pay by the hour for his time. This is not legal advice, this is friendly advice from your neighbor Dolphin314etc. Shop around. You should be able to find a package from somebody that does a volume business in real estate closings. Try to pay less than $1,000 for the legal services.

What to do with the money? If it were mine, say $100,000, I would buy 10 oz gold and 10 oz platinum bars from Englehardt Metals, and I would get a Small Mosler safe, and install it in a secret place at home, and put the bars in there. But that's me. You may want to roll it over into a new house so you don't have to take any capital gains on your sale of the old house. You may want to put it into high dividend stocks.

Act in haste, repent as liesure.

You were right to come to me.

Keep asking around.

Build your own mosaic out of the best advice you get.

Do not let this deal slip away from you. If the cash is good, don't dither. Finding a "live one" is not so easy these days.

The little servant of all mankind,

Dolphin314etc

Be sure to handle the transaction through escrow. Escrow is a neutral party that is tasked with making sure all requirements of the contract are met before title changes to the buyer, so escrow will not close until the funds are wired to the escrow holder and all accounts settled.

Yes you can get ripped off doing that, the buyer needs to have funds in hand at the closing. Wiring funds that right there is suspicious. Go talk to a real estate lawyer.

Yes, you could have fake transactions that fool you. You need to go through an escrow company to handle this transaction. For sale by owner puts you at a huge stupid risk.

YES, you could get ripped off. Go through ESCROW.