Are Illinois tax sales unique or am I missing something?

[James Fleisch]

Illinois has the highest real estate taxes in the nation.  The upside of this is that there is a robust tax sale listing for each county.  ILtaxsale.com  handles nearly every counties tax sales.  I'm posting this because I recently placed a bid for the first time and I'm waiting to hear the results.  The way I understand it, if no one buys the back taxes after 3 years the county has claim the property.  I believe they do some research to look for liens and anything they think is not free and clear is removed from the listing.  The remaining properties are then listed at auction usually once a year. The county I live in wipes out all the back taxes and you bid by writing a check in the amount of your bid. It is a sealed bid.  If you are the winner you have 30 days to do a title search and if something comes up you get your money back and if not ownership is transfered over to you after 90 days and taxes don't start until the next year.   Do any of you have experience with this sort of a tax sale?  It seems pretty straight forward but is there anything I may be missing?  Do any of you in other states have similar types of county tax sales?

Thanks,

James