What if you are really interested in buying tax liens, but you don’t live in a state that has tax lien sales, and you don’t live within driving distance of a state that does sell tax liens? One alternative to buying tax liens at a physical auction is to participate in the online tax sales. Only a few states have tax lien sales online, but fortunately each state that does have online tax sales conducts their sale at a different time of the year. So you can participate in an online tax lien sale somewhere in the United States in almost any season of the year.
There are only 5 states that have tax sales online; they are Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Indiana, and Maryland. Even in those states, not all counties have online tax sales. You can find a list of these counties with links to the tax sale websites, and other details about their tax sales in my “Guide to Buying Tax Liens Online” on the members area of TaxLienLady.com. The online tax sales are very different in each state, but they do have a few things in common.
You need to register for online tax sales days or in some counties weeks ahead of the actual sale. You register for the tax sale and bid on the properties online. You are not actually bidding on the property, but on the tax lien certificate that is being auctioned. These sales usually require a deposit, and some of them have a non-refundable registration fee. Payment for the liens that you are successful bidding on is required within a day or two of the close of the tax sale for tax sales that use wire transfers as the method of payment. For tax sales that use ACH Debit as the method of payment for tax liens, you usually have to pay the day of the close of the tax sale. For these tax sales, you agree before hand to allow the county treasurer to debit your account for the tax liens that you purchase.
These counties make it easy for you to register and bid online. The hardest part of buying tax liens online is doing your due diligence for the tax sale properties. Unless you purchase a tax sale list from a tax sale list provider, or in some cases from the county, you don’t always get to see the list of properties that are in the tax sale. Instead the properties are listed individually or in batches by an id number and you have to click on the property number to get the rest of the information on the property. For some counties there is very little information given about the property. This is where buying a detailed or enhanced list, with all of the assessment information for the property can me very helpful.
