Anyone Familiar With Los Angeles County Tax Sales and Auctions?

[Ramon Martinez]

Any agents or investors in the LA county area familiar with LA County's tax sale procedure? I met an investor in Orange County who goes straight to the courthouse steps, making it seem like a pretty straightforward process. I'm assuming LA county is much larger and more populous county and therefore more confusing. 

I've used a third party site that indicates there are many tax sales/auctions (is there a difference) happening at several different locations throughout the county; anyone know how to consolidate this disparate locations through a single service (website? auction house?)

Speaking of which, anyone having any luck using Zillow's pre-forclosure stats? I never really trust anything on Zillow since it's a pay to play service, but let me know if you differ. 

Finally, anyone know if it's possible to pull a property out of the auction procedures by working with the owner to buy/list their property? 

Thanks!