Buying Tax Liens Online
By JoanneWhat 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.
You can find out more about buying tax liens online in my Guide to Buying Tax Liens Online. It?s free bonus for you when you try the members area of TaxLienLady.com. In the members area you?ll find a four lesson audio course on how to get started investing in tax liens and tax deeds as well as teleseminars, webinars, how-to videos, and interviews with the experts? – with new content added monthly ? all for only $29.95 a month. To find out more about the extra bonuses that you get when you try the members area of TaxLienLady.com go to www.TaxLienLady.com/Membership.htm.

3 Comments
December 20th, 2009 at 9:23 pm
You can do a search at http://www.tax-lien-database.com to find out which counties host online auctions. You can also find out which counties offer liens/deeds Over The Counter (OTC). OTC is another great way to to invest outside of your immediate area without attending auctions in person.
Good luck with all your investing ventures!
January 2nd, 2011 at 8:19 pm
Were can you obtain a “Enhanced” list of property description?
How recent or accurate is it?
Am only interested in buying lax liens.
January 3rd, 2011 at 9:27 am
Hi Vicky,
You’ve asked a very good question. Actually I think it would be a good subject for another blog post and I know that I’ve written a couple of articles about it. You can click on the catagory “tax sale lists” on this blog and see what articles come up. I would start with the county tax collector’s or county treasurer’s web site first. Sometimes they have very detailed lists available online. But most of the time the lists they publish have very limited information. If that is the case then I would look to purchase a “detailed” or “enhanced” list from a tax sale list provider. These lists can vary greatly among counties, even with the same provider. I use TaxLienLady-database to get my lists, we don’t have enhanced lists right now, but we will provide them soon. In the meantime you can log on to http://www.TaxSaleResources.com with your TaxLienLady-database log on information and purchase enhanced lists there.