Action at the auction

Today, we went to the annual tax sale, which takes the from of an auction, in which properties are sold to the highest bidder. It works like this: People who fail to pay their real-estate taxes three year in a row, see their holdings put on the selling block to the benefit of the highest bidder. We occasionally attend these events and have purchased property by that mean, in the past.

The county summit council chamber, where the auction took place, was packed with bidders. In fact, the county employees had to bring extra chairs to accommodate everyone. Before the sale, we had targeted a few properties and assigned a maximum price we were willing to spend on each one of them. Auction sales can take a life of their own and are highly unpredictable; it all depends on the participants and their interaction.

This year, properties sold for much more money than we were willing to pay, which is a good sign that there's more money floating around. We didn't bring anything home but had nonetheless a great time participating and learned one things or two in the process... See you next year!