Originally Posted by Pink Panther
Really? Most people who have cash in the bank, don't pay cash for anything...
Plenty of people invest in real estate, and "cash" transactions do not mean actual bills changing hands, but more often certified cheques or bank drafts for the amount of purchase. What makes it a "cash" transaction is that the price is paid in full in an immediately redeemable form, not by credit or mortgage or through any kind of financing.
I bought my own property for "cash" (actually a bank draft, something like a certified cheque) and I'm not wealthy, but it was advantageous to avoid a mortgage or borrowing money. People sometimes buy farm properties, like the one in Ayr, for tax purposes; also, they may buy rental or residential units as a revenue-generating source which provides tax benefits and (with luck) a much better return on investment than stocks or many other investment possibilities.
Millard could have been purchasing properties in cash for sound financial reasons, although it does not appear from what we know about him that he had a head for business and his motives might well have been quite different. However, people in modest circumstances as well as investors can and do pay "cash" (meaning as explained above) for real estate properties, and the fact that he did so is not, in and of itself, particularly remarkable or suspicious.