FAQ’s

To participate in a Philadelphia Sheriff’s Sale, you will need to take the following steps:

1. Visit Bid4Assets.com and register for a free account. There are no monthly fees for having an account.

2. Submit a single deposit via certified funds by wire transfer or certified check at least one week before the bidding opens for the auction. Note: If you do not win any auctions, your deposit will be refunded within 10 business days.

3. Log in to your Bid4Assets account at the hours specified for the sale you’re interested in to place your bids.

Bid4Assets has been a pioneer in the online property sales market since its founding in 1999. It has provided sales services for more than 100 government agencies, including successfully launching virtual sheriff’s sales in Montgomery, Adams, Berks and Monroe counties in Pennsylvania since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. The company has over 750,000 registered bidders nationwide, including more than 16,000 registered bidders in Pennsylvania.

Bid4Assets takes security and safeguarding information very seriously and has been a federal contractor for over 20 years, meeting the federal government’s standards for security and encryption.

Bid4Assets utilizes an auto-bid system, meaning you can enter the maximum amount you are willing to pay for a property and the site will automatically continue bidding up to that amount on your behalf. You can also manually bid up by an auction’s increments if that is your preference.

You can file a Motion to Set Aside the sale before the deed is transferred to the new owner. During the filing, you can stay in your home. If your motion is denied, you will be displaced from the property according to the rule of law.

They will be posted monthly.

No, you do not. Your deposit covers all properties being sold on that particular date.

Bid4Assets has a paper bid packet. Contact their customer service team and they will send you all the information necessary for you to be able to bid on properties in a specific auction.

The Sheriff’s Office website is updated regularly to reflect changing information.

A cashier’s check – couple days; wire transfers are typically cleared the next day. When bidders go in to access deposit instructions on Bid4Assets, you’ll see a memo. Please include that memo when you pay – it will greatly speed up the process.

The most up-to-date information can be found on Bid4Assets’ dedicated Philadelphia Sheriff Sale page.

No, the $10,000 deposit is for mortgage sales. The deposit for tax sales is $1,500.

This process is actually more democratic than in-person sales. No intimidation, no favoritism, no human error during the bidding process, and an overtime feature that will prevent sniping. Early bidder deposit data shows that roughly 80% of bidders are coming from the Philadelphia area.

The most accurate, up-to-date information is found on the Bid4Assets website. The Philadelphia Sheriff’s website is currently undergoing maintenance to make it capable of handling increased sale-related activity.

If a property is subject to mortgage, you would not receive a clean title. You would be responsible for taking on that mortgage. The information about the mortgage will be advertised. You can view that information in the ad. If you are unsure, contact our office and we will be happy to assist you.

Yes.

Yes.

The process is the same. The only difference is that on the tax sale, you are required to obtain a tax compliance certificate.

Tax compliance letters – the time frame is 30 days. You are required to pay your balance within 15 days. We will give that time for the tax compliance to come in. We must receive it within that 30-day window. If we do not receive it within that 30-day window, you are considered to be in default and you will forfeit your 10% deposit. But if you can show the department that you have applied for it and that it is being delayed, you can ask for an extension.

Tax compliance letters – the time frame is 30 days. You are required to pay your balance within 15 days. We will give that time for the tax compliance to come in. We must receive it within that 30-day window. If we do not receive it within that 30-day window, you are considered to be in default and you will forfeit your 10% deposit. But if you can show the department that you have applied for it and that it is being delayed, you can ask for an extension.

For mortgage foreclosure sales, you will need to deposit $10,000. For tax sales, you will need to deposit $1,500. There is an additional $35 processing fee on each deposit submitted.

Yes – the Bid4Assets platform has been optimized to run on a variety of devices.

For mortgage foreclosure sales, bids must be made in increments of at least $1,000. For tax sales, they must be made in increments of at least $100.

No, you cannot bid until the auction opens. These auctions typically open at 10 a.m. and close at 1 p.m. If a bid is placed during the final five minutes of an auction, the auction will go into overtime and five more minutes must pass without another bid being placed before the auction will close.

If you win an auction, Bid4Assets will send you a notification via email and via alert in your account’s message center notifying you that you are the winning bidder. Once you receive this notification, you will be able to access the DeedWizard tool located on your account to access payment instructions and submit vesting information.

All Bid4Assets bids are treated as legally binding agreements. If, after winning an auction, you do not submit payment in the time allotted by that auction’s terms of sale, your account will be marked as non-performing. You will forfeit any deposit/down payment paid to the Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office and you may be suspended from the site and/or prohibited from participating in future auctions.

The second bidder would then become the default winner of the auction and would be entitled to the same claim as the first bidder previously had to the property, provided the second bidder fulfills the terms of sale.

Buyers must pay the balance of 10% of the purchase price plus a 10% buyer’s premium (on the total purchase price) by 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on the first business day following the auction. Buyers will have 15 calendar days from the auction date to pay the remaining balance.

Even if you win a bid on a Tax Sale property, within nine months of the acknowledgment of the deed, the owner of record can go to court and get permission to recover the property by paying all back taxes and the money paid by the winning bidder.  This is called the Right of Redemption.  Therefore, if you purchase a property through Delinquent Tax Sheriff Sale and invest funds to improve the property in the first year, beware that those funds can be lost.  The right of Redemption is only applicable if the property scheduled for Tax Sale is determined to be owner-occupied 90 days prior to the sale.  If the property is unoccupied or abandoned, there is no Right of Redemption.

The Right of Redemption does not apply to any property sold at the Mortgage Foreclosure Sheriff Sale.  One way to protect yourself is to contact the City’s Department of Licenses and Inspections to determine what outstanding code violations, if any, exist in the property.

Tax delinquent sales are the sales where the City and County of Philadelphia are going after persons who owe money and who are delinquent on their taxes. Tax lien sales are tax-delinquent properties that have gotten older and have been sold to the attorneys and the attorneys are now selling them.

There is no fee for paper bidding.

If the bid winner satisfies the terms of sale, they will receive a deed.

They will all go live at the same time – 10 a.m. – and will be live until the sale closes at 1 p.m. There is a five-minute overtime available when a bid comes in after 12:55 p.m.

Yes, the auctions will be staggered, with batches closing in ten-minute intervals at 1:00 pm, 1:10 pm, etc. Also remember that you can put in your maximum proxy bid at any time during the 3-hour open bidding window, so you do not need to wait until the last minute.

Yes. If you did not win any sales, you will be given the option to roll your deposit into the next auction.

You do not automatically become the 2^ndbidder – you are given the option and must accept that option to become the second bidder.

It is considered to be trespassing to walk on a property that is not yours without the explicit invitation to do so. The Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office urges you to do your due diligence virtually or by examining the property from a public area.

If the property is being sold subject to mortgage, then that second mortgage would be your responsibility. If the property is not being sold subject to mortgage and there is a second mortgage on it, then it is the responsibility of the attorney putting the property up for sale to notify the second mortgage company that the property is going to sale. They would have to bid their interest.

We are working on getting that information out. If you have any questions, you can contact the state, or contact our office to see if we have any information on a property from the state.

No. We do not receive that information from the court.

We are working with our city partners to remove the lien following a tax sale. We will send them the information and they are notified once the deed is recorded. It is the city department’s responsibility to remove the lien.

Please review the auction’s terms of sale for more information on the status of the title. Many foreclosures or tax foreclosures may be subject to certain types of liens.

No, the Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office does not have keys to any properties.

Bidders should NOT set foot on any property prior to the auction, as that would constitute trespassing. You can only view the property from public areas such as the road or sidewalk. It is not advisable to approach occupants of a property. The Sheriff does not have any photos or information on the condition of the property.

You should consult with an attorney if you acquire an occupied property to understand your rights, as well as the occupants’ rights. Unless you are able to work out an agreement with the occupants, you may need to file an eviction action.

A reserve price is a hidden amount that the bidding must reach in order to result in a third-party sale. In order to successfully purchase a foreclosure property, you must be the winning bidder AND meet the reserve price. The reserve price will be the total of the attorney’s upset price and the sheriff’s cost. The auction does not disclose the reserve price, but it will tell you whether or not the reserve price has been met.

Thirty days from the date of settlement or the auction, we get a distribution policy. If you are a person who has an interest in the property and you aren’t on the list, you have 10 days to file an exception. Once we get the list with the exceptions and the distribution policy, the recording of the deed process will start.

You must contact your lender as soon as possible. Since they are the responsible party for listing your property, only their lawyer can do anything about the situation.

It is strongly encouraged that you do this by wire transfer because of the timing. The rest of the payment can be made by check since you have 15 days for this.

When a property is sold for more than the amount owed in foreclosure or back taxes, the owner is entitled to the excess monies. Since 2012 the Sheriff’s HART Unit has returned more than $20 million to people whose properties were sold at Sheriff Sale. There is no need to pay a finder’s fee to a third-party independent agent or attorney, who can charge between 15 and 30% of the recovered funds. If your home/property was sold at a Sheriff Sale due to foreclosure or back taxes and the final price was more than the amount owed, you are the rightful recipient of a refund of the excess monies paid for the property.

You can use the Recorder of Deeds and Prothonotary’s Office for this.

Sheriff Sales will not be going back to in-person events in the near future; they will continue to be online. During that time, the Sheriff’s Office will be constantly monitoring the metrics of the online sales process, and will make adjustments to the process as needed – that includes the possibility of a return to in-person sales.

Yes – property sales can be postponed or stayed at any time.

Yes, the city is open for you to do your due diligence. It is STRONGLY RECOMMENDED that you do so.

Yes.

You only need to put up one deposit to bid in a particular sale, even if you want to bid on many properties. You’ll fund the remainder of 10% of the balance for what you’ve won after the auction. Please do NOT send more than the deposit before the auction. You cannot cancel bids or back out of a sale after the auction, so please complete your due diligence before you bid. If you do not complete a sale, you will forfeit your deposit and be banned from future sales.

We will continue to process deposits via wire transfer after the deadline, but once the deadline has passed we cannot guarantee you will be cleared in time.

You are not the rightful owner of the property until you have received a recorded deed in hand. You cannot do anything until you have that deed. If you know for certain that the property is unoccupied, we recommend you contact a locksmith to gain entry to the property.

The instructions for submitting tax compliance forms are on the Bid4Assets website. There is an email address that is provided by the Department of Revenue. You would submit your information to them and they will submit your tax compliance certificate after review.

It means the law firm has not yet provided the minimum bid for a property.

You must provide both the business and personal names.

Fifteen calendar days, but if Day 15 falls on a weekend or a federal holiday, then it would be due the first business day after that.

About the Office of The Sheriff of Philadelphia

As the pandemic continues, the Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office wants to ensure that Philadelphia residents can remain in their homes, which is why the Sheriff’s Office supports any programs that help residents. It is important that Philadelphia residents contact the Sheriff’s Office if they believe they have been illegally evicted by someone who was impersonating a Deputy Sheriff. The Sheriff’s Office will also continue to host food giveaways and virtual town halls to answer any questions that residents may have. If there are any questions that a resident may have, they can reach out to the Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office at 215-686-3560 or 215-686-3542.