Bellevue, NE · Member since 2013 · 72 posts · 29 votes
The annual Sarpy County Nebraska Tax Lien Sale is coming up on Monday 6 March 2017. I live in Bellevue and plan on attending to just watch and learn the process in the hopes of participating next year, when I have some money that I wouldn't mind being tied up. Is anyone from the Omaha or Lincoln area going to attend who has been before?
Bellevue, NE · Member since 2013 · 72 posts · 29 votes
9y
@Collin Schwartz I did go, I am working on typing up my notes now and should have them put together in a little while. Overall, if you go trying to buy a specific parcel's taxes you will go home empty handed as many investors did today. It is best to do your research on every property you can afford and hope that you get a chance to bid on it.
Bellevue, NE · Member since 2013 · 72 posts · 29 votes
9y
Here are my notes.
The sale was held in the board room on the second floor of the administration building. The room was full with around 100 people present, but each person was able to represent up to 20 companies this year, resulting in 1455 total bidders. Even with the 100 different people and each person being able to represent 20 different companies it seemed that there were about 10 different groups of people bidding. The group in front of me consisted of 15 people representing one company and represented 300 out of the 1455 bidders.
Once the sale started the treasurer randomly selected a bidnumber out of a hat to start with, today it was 847. Then in Parcel number order the tax liens were sold in a Round Robbin fashion. We went through the list of Real Propertytaxes, skipping all values under $400 and all Out lots. The first parcel on the list 010320016 was offered to bidder 847. They bought the lien on this property so the next parcel on the list was offered to bidder 848, if bidder 848 passed on the next parcel and bidder 849 bought it, bidder 848 had to wait for the number to come back to them waiting for the next 1454 bidders to either pay the taxes on a parcel or skip. At the end of the sale we made it to number 86, so bidders 87 through 846 never had first chance to purchase taxes on a property. And at the end of the sale many investors left without getting any liens and were out the registration fee, as it is non-refundable. The Real Property sale was over at 10:16 AM.
Most of the investors left at this point with only a couple of groups (about ¼) remaining, to bid on Special Assessments, this list was short and only 3 or 4 were bid on. The remaining investors left but one group and one individual who were interested in parcels under $400. The single investor had interest in 5 parcels and was able to get 2 of them. Once the only the large group remained they submitted their list to the treasurer to purchase the rest of the liens since there was no other competition.
Overall it looks like there is a large amount of competition in Sarpy County for Real Property Tax Liens and going in you need to have done the research to be willing to buy any potential property that comes your way, since once your number gets called it is doubtful that it will get called again unless it is for a parcel no one else wants.
Bellevue, NE · Member since 2013 · 72 posts · 29 votes
9y
@Rita Urban Your welcome, I was surprised that no one from bigger pockets was going to attend. So I figured that I would provide my own experience to help others who were curious and so I have something to remember for when the sale comes around again next time.
Investor · Bennington, NE · Member since 2014 · 28 posts · 5 votes
9y
We attended the Dodge Co tax sale as there weren't as many bidders. The easiest way to get as many bidding opportunities as possible is to have multiple entities & multiple people spread throughout the bidder numbers at each tax sale. For Douglas & Sarpy Co we typically just try to find the big corporate buyers that have no interest in getting a property whatsoever. They just want the guaranteed 14% interest.
Ottawa, IL · Member since 2016 · 242 posts · 107 votes
9y
@Jeremy Prunty - I would be interested in this process as well. It seems like the tax sales aren't always the way to go for everyone (especially just individual investors with limited funds) so I'm wondering what do you do exactly to find which ones these big corporate buyers own and what do you offer? If they say no to 14% do you move up if you know it's worth it or just move on to another?