Where can I buy list of owners who are delinquent on their property taxes

Question

I would be interest in buying the names and addresses of property owners that are delinquent for more than a year.

I would also really like to buy the name of any former property owner that is still within the redemption period (those can be the best)

Answer me here or message me (I will find your messages faster), I dont need the whole state of Texas, I only need a few counties at a time

Corby Goade · Answer

Make friends with an awesome title officer. In some counties, they can really easily pull those types of lists for you and they don't charge.

Bruce Lynn · Answer

Delinquent you can probably get for free or a fairly low charge from you county tax assessor or CAD, but will be county by county.

One thing you probably want to think about before you get this list is what types of properties you want and try to limit the data you get.

Maybe you only want in a certain price range, or maybe only accounts with homes, or people that owe $3000 or more, and the delimiters go on and on.   If you don't do this up front, you can spend a lot of time and energy shifting and sorting a lot of data or marketing to people you don't really want to deal with.

Also I notice many investors don't want one year delinquent...but maybe more like 3 years.....if they're only a year behind...often those will get paid.

As for people in redemption period....that is tough...very little data I've ever found for after sale...unless you are there.   Brazoria does publish what sold and price paid and who purchased...I think it is Brazoria, but that's about the only one I've seen.   You might be able to get some data for the bigger counties from Roddy.

What is your strategy with those people?   From what I understand you cannot buy redemption rights in Texas any more.  Law changed it seems 4-5 years ago.   I guess you could loan them the money to redeem, but since the property is no longer in their name, you cant take the property as collateral or have lien against it.  So if you're thinking of trying to buy these I think it would very much be an uphill battle in Texas....years ago there were some people who would track the sales and then go buy redemption rights...but that seems to have ended for the most part due to law changes.   Most of the people who loose the property probably don't have many things of value or they would not have let it go to sale...so would be tough to lend on other assets they have I would think.

Charley C. · Answer

in the 1930's I saw on some deed history where a man bought the rights for the person that lost their property in a tax sale, then he paid the redemption and took 200 acres on the freeway for peanuts. Thats orgin of this idea

For what its worth, I am heir (one of many) to 10 may be 100,000 acres (it was in the 1950's; paid to our family to satisfy a debt) deep in the desert of west texas but nobody, no county clerk, no apprisal district can find the records?? hmm (I dont even know the county). Last person that seen the land died over 30 years ago, "it was too dry to run cattle". Now there is more oil there than the middle east. Pretty sure that recorded deed was put in someones fire place that worked at the clerks office

Bruce Lynn · Answer

Well it all sound good, but my guess is you will have a very tough time with the redemption part.  90% or probably 99% of the title companies in Texas probably have no idea what a redemption is or how to do one and it takes time....so I'm going to guess this will be next to impossible.   I don't really think you'll be able to redeem or have the previous owner redeem at closing. but best wishes if you want to try.    Probably what you're thinking about as in the past, you could purchase the redemption rights from them and close yourself, but the law changed...I think about 5 years ago, but I don't remember when that says you can't buy redemption rights.  If you buy after the sale, I'm guessing too you have a little difficulty signing contracts for people to sell you something they don't own anymore, unless you're ok with that, and they're ok with selling a fraudulent contract.   You could potentially buy before the sale...then you don't have to worry about redemption, you just pay off the taxes at closing.....but if you buy after the sale, that person doesn't own the property any more.   I guess you could both sign a contract if you both agree to it, but in my opinion not really valid if they don't own the property any more.

I agree with you about some of the small counties...and maybe some of the big ones too....I've seen properties in Dallas county where taxes haven't been paid for 20 years.....Now the minimum bid is more than the property is worth.   One day in a small county I had a nice discussion with either the CAD person or tax assessor about why didn't they foreclose earlier.  Nice property, but I think they waited something like 9 years to foreclose, so now price doesn't make sense to investors....her comment was, well the guy was sick, didn't have any money, and we felt bad for him.  So they waited until he passed to foreclose.  Now that property is going to sit for a while until they figure out what to do with it, no one is going to pay taxes on it until it finally gets sold, so they loose 2-3-4-5 years of revenue.  In the meantime the poor school district and poor taxing entities have also been deprived of funds they needed to operate for years, and will forego it all until it gets back on the tax role.

As you must have found out, it is not as easy to get these lists as everyone says.  I don't think I've ever found a past due list on a county website or any easy way to search for the whole list.  Some you can search properties 1x1, but not get a list of 1000 past due.  Even if you could, probably not a good way to shift and sort it.   I've found in the places uncooperative it can help to take a dozen donuts and a keg of coffee when you go in, and then ask for the list.  Even though many of these people have worked there for years, many probably have never had the request or really know how to produce one.   I remember one small county I asked, they said they would work on it, and to come back in the afternoon and they had 3 reams of paper stacked up where they had printed 1 per page.  No charge, but I told them I would bring them paper back next time I visited.

Let us know if you have any success.

Charley C. · Answer

thanks for the input, everybody

We all can find dysfunction slightly corrupt governments are all over the planet. SMALL Appraisal districts often are just that.  I am not saying where my hard work found them but know there are no shortages of what I just described

You see, those types of appraisal districts don’t want to foreclose on their friends mobile homes or old family farms so its an big ordeal for them to auction off the local neighbor’s homes. They do tax sales like every 2 years

I can be a jerk with the open records act and all but thought it would be easier to just buy the information.. and skip searching with just the white pages usually nets my results, Not whole lot of money to be made but it looks like a good living

Now to answer the question about the redemption period, if the redemption amount is low enough, it works. At closing, redeem the home, buy it from that person who redeemed (or in the act of at closing) it. you will need a cooperative title company. And I seen it done many years go but not recently

Wale Lawal · Answer

@Charley C.

At the County website, you can always find the list there. When you call the County or you get ahold of them online, you can say, you’d like to have the list. Many of them will actually send you the list, but they get away from that because they don’t want to spend the money mailing things to you. So they’ll probably refer you to a website.

Direct mailing is the most effective way to contact delinquent property owners. Keep in mind that these owners are on the verge of losing their homes, so your letter should be short and straight to the point. You should make your intentions clear in the first line. In fact, the letter should not include anything other than your purchase offer and contact info. To achieve a higher response rate, make sure that the phrasing conveys a sense of urgency. Owners are more likely to take action if they receive a letter with an urgent tone.

All the best!

Eliott Elias · Answer

Monthly subscriptions like propstream, you get every distressed list. $100 a month and you have to pay to skiptrace.

John Underwood · Answer

Check with the county of interest.

Henry Clark · Answer

look up the guy posting doing GIS searches.

Where can I buy list of owners who are delinquent on their property taxes

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