Home Offer Contingencies not standard in North Carolina
Generally speaking, a contingency is part of an offer to purchase a home that must be met before the offer can be finalized. If it is not met, the buyer will normally get their due diligence fee and deposit back.
Examples could be: 1) an offer contingent on a buyer selling their existing home first, 2) the home appraisal being at or above the offer amount, 3) contingent on the buyers loan being approved 4) contingent on inspection results, etc
However, in North Carolina contingencies have not been part of the standard offer to purchase used in most transactions for a number of years now. So they don’t happen very often.
They are not illegal, but you would have to pay to have an attorney prepare a custom addendum for your transaction. And because it is a seller's market, in a competitive situation, a seller is less likely to accept an offer with a contingency - - everything else being equal.