too hot to hold
A place that has too much police activity to harbor a fugitive unnoticed.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
“The thief left town because the city was too hot to hold.”
“The spy leaves the country because the capital is too hot to hold.”
“After the police raided the warehouse, the gang realized the neighborhood was too hot to hold.”
“The bank robbers decided to split up because they felt the small village was too hot to hold after the local sheriff started questioning every stranger.”
“With undercover officers patrolling every street corner, the smugglers knew their usual meeting spot was now too hot to hold.”
“Realizing that the relentless investigation had rendered the entire region too hot to hold, the fugitive fled across the border under the cover of night.”
The idiom derives from the slang application of the word hot to denote stolen goods. In this context, a thief or fence finds an item too hot to hold when the risks of possession, usually due to police attention or the prominence of the theft, outweigh the potential for profit. The phrase emerged as a description of the immediate physical necessity to divest oneself of such property before it results in a legal complication.
- 01
apron-string hold
An estate held by a man during his wife's life.
- 02
baking hot
Very hot.
- 03
blow hot air
To engage in empty or exaggerated talk that lacks substance, credibility, or truth; to bluster.
- 04
blow hot and cold
To behave inconsistently; to vacillate or to waver, as between extremes of opinion or emotion.
- 05
boiling hot
Extremely hot (having a high temperature: of an object, the weather, a living creature).
- 06
buy and hold
A passive investment strategy where an investor purchases an asset and retains it for many years, rather than trading it frequently.
- 07
come in hot
To enter the scene of conflict quickly and aggressively.
- 08
don't hold your breath
Don't wait. Said cynically to suggest that what has just been mentioned is unlikely to happen soon or at all.
Last updated August 10, 2026