Which Lien State Has the Highest Interest Rate?

Posted on October 18, 2010 by Debby

One of the most frequent questions that I get is: “Which state has the highest interest rate for tax lien investing?” The answer is Illinois. Illinois has a default interest rate of 18%, but it’s not 18% per annum – it’s 18% per six months. So the per annum rate is 36%. That’s higher than and of the other tax lien states. The interest rate is bid down at the tax sale, and except for Cook county, which started conducting online tax sales last year, you have to physically go to the sale in order to bid.

But what if you could have someone else bid for you in Illinois? How would you like to have a tax lien agent that specializes in buying tax lien certificates in Illinois and also buying redeemable deeds in Texas and Georgia? Continue reading →

Posted in redeemable tax deeds, Tax Lien Agents | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Where Are The Tax Sales?

Posted on October 14, 2010 by Joanne

So you want to invest in tax lien certificates or tax deeds, But how do you find out about the tax sales? How do you know which counties in which states have tax sales online and when the tax sales are conducted?

I use TaxLienLady-database.com when I want to find out what tax sales are coming up. If you’re a member of the database, you can do a custom search and find out what online tax sales are coming up in the next few weeks. But even if you don’t have a subscription to TaxLienLady-database.com you can still do a basic search to find which states have tax deed sales and which states have tax lien sales, and when each state has their tax sales.

Here’s what the list looks like: Continue reading →

Posted in Tax Lien Investing, tax sales | Tagged , | Comments Off on Where Are The Tax Sales?

Tax Lien Investing Basics: Finding the Tax Sale Information

Posted on October 6, 2010 by Debby

tax lienlady database
The first thing that you need to do once you decide where you want to invest in tax liens or tax deeds is get the tax sale information and the tax sale list.

But how do you do that?

There are 3 ways that I use to get information about tax sales. The first 2 ways are free. One thing that you can do if you want to find out about tax sales in your county is call the county tax collector or treasurer and ask them for the information about the tax sale. They should be able to tell you when the next tax sale is, where it will be held, and where you can get a list of properties in the tax sale. Some county treasurers will even have this information posted on their web site along with the rules of the sale and registration guidelines.

If you need to look up county information in another state you can use the website www.NACO.org. NACO is the National Organization of Counties, and on this site you can search for a state and get a listing of all of the counties in that state. When you click on the county you can get demographic information for the county and in most cases a link to the county web site where you can search for the tax collector’s and tax assessor’s web sites. Some counties have more information online than others, and you have to be a little bit of detective to find the information on the tax sale if it is in fact posted online – sometimes it isn’t. But you can usually at least find the contact information for the county treasurer so that you can call and get the information about the tax sale.

Continue reading →

Posted in Tax Lien Investing, Tax Sale Lists | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments Off on Tax Lien Investing Basics: Finding the Tax Sale Information

Double Digit Returns Without the Risk of the Stock Market

Posted on September 27, 2010 by Debby

Are you tired of losing money to the market? Want to know how you can get double digit returns on your money and still sleep well, knowing that your money is in a safe investment? Well you can get double-digit returns with real estate guaranteed tax lien certificates.

Now is a great time to start investing in tax liens, especially since other traditional long term investments, like stocks, and traditional real estate are in turmoil. With the stock market you don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, but the interest that you get on your tax lien portfolio does not fluctuate with the market or the economy, it stays consistent over time. And unlike other real estate investments, you don’t need a lot of money to get started and you are in first position, even ahead of the mortgage. Continue reading →

Posted in Online Investing, tax sales | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Double Digit Returns Without the Risk of the Stock Market

Is Bidding At The Tax Sale Changing?

Posted on September 15, 2010 by Joanne


Decisions, Decisions

There were 2 different tax sales that I could have gone to today. The Monroe County upset tax sale was today, but there were also 8 different tax sales going on in New Jersey, most of them at or around the same time. I could have attended a deed sale in the Pennsylvania county that I live in or one of the tax lien sales in New Jersey. Since I had a few prior liens at one of the New Jersey tax sales, that’s the one that I attended. And since this is the first tax sale in New Jersey that I attended this season, I noticed some differences from last year.

So what is changing regarding tax lien sales in New Jersey?

Although I was able to get the liens on properties that I was a prior lienholder on at 18%, I only got one other small lien and that was at 2%. I was willing to bid down to 2% because I know that I can pay subsequent sewer taxes (this was a sewer lien) and get 8% on my subs. Even small sewer liens went at premium. In NJ the interest rate can be bid down to 0% and then premium can be bid for liens. The odd thing about this sale is that both individual investors and institutional investors were willing to pay premium for small sewer liens but the larger liens went at 18% to one of the institutional investors. Continue reading →

Posted in Tax Lien Investing | 2 Comments