Tax Lien Sale

The Tax Lien Sale is the final step in the effort to collect taxes on real property and mobile homes. The following information is offered to answer your questions regarding the sale. If you have any additional questions please call us at 719-520-7900.

**SB24-183 suspended all collection efforts for property taxes on Mobile Homes. Mobile homes will not accrue interest, shall not be advertised and shall not be distrained for the 2023 taxes due in 2024. With respect to the ongoing deliberation and review conducted by the established Task Force, this will also apply for the 2024 taxes due in 2025. The bill is accessible through the Colorado General Assembly’s website: Mobile Home Taxation Task Force | Colorado General Assembly

The interest rate set by the Colorado State Bank Commissioner for any tax lien sold in 2025, is 14% per annum or 1.17% per month.

The 2025 Tax Lien Sale will be held Wednesday, October 22nd on the internet. The sale will be administered by RealAuction, and is conducted with the goal of fairness and efficiency.

Registration on RealAuction will be open Wednesday, September 24, 8:00 AM through Wednesday, October 15, 2:00 PM (Mountain Time)

Training sessions are available through Real Auction. Training dates are October 4th and 10th. Anyone interested in training must register at https://www.realauction.com/training.

The list of taxes available to purchase at the tax lien sale is advertised for three consecutive weeks prior to the sale in the Colorado Springs Gazette. The 2024 (Payable in 2025) Delinquent Taxes publication will be available on:

Wednesday, September 10th

Wednesday, September 17th

Wednesday, September 24th

Properties are not removed from the publication if they are paid during the publishing cycles. Properties will be removed from Real Auction as they are paid.

The interest rate offered at each year’s tax sale is nine points above the discount rate set on September 1. The annual interest rate for the 2025 tax lien sale is 14%, which accrues monthly at 1.17% for the duration of the outstanding tax lien.

You are purchasing the taxes due on a property. This does not give you ownership or legal rights to the property in any way. Most people participate in the sale because the interest rates are much better than those offered in savings accounts or CDs. Fewer than 1% of all tax liens actually end up going to deed. Individuals wishing to obtain property may wish to contact the Public Trustee regarding foreclosure sales.

Any taxes not sold at the sale are held by the county and are, in some cases, available to purchase through the Treasurer’s Office. These generally involve properties of low value such as un-buildable strips of land or open space.

Approximately two weeks later you will receive a copy of your Certificates of Purchase.

If the taxes for the following year become delinquent, you will be given the opportunity in August to endorse the taxes onto the certificates you hold. This enables you to pay the delinquent taxes and add them to your existing tax lien certificate of purchase without attending the tax lien sale. You will receive the same interest rate on the subsequent taxes as you did on the original tax sale purchase. If your certificates are eligible for endorsement, you will be notified by mail in August.

When the taxes are redeemed, you will receive a check for the amount of your certificate plus interest. The Treasurer’s Office prefers to keep all original Certificates of Purchase, however if the Certificate of Purchase is in your possession, you will need to return it to our office. Upon receipt of the Certificate, you will receive a check, which will include the amount of tax you purchased plus the interest that has accrued from the day of sale to the date of redemption. You are not refunded for any premium bids that were paid.

Upcoming for 2026: Please reach out to our office via email (trsweb@elpasoco.com) if you would like to receive redemption payments via ACH.

The redemption period is three years from the year of the original tax sale. Certificates sold in 2022 are eligible for application of a Treasurer’s Deed in 2025. It is not required that three consecutive years of taxes be due. It is only required that the original lien remain unpaid for the three year redemption period.

In January, you will receive a 1099 showing the interest you earned for the year on your Certificates of Purchase that were redeemed. We are required to report interest paid to our investors to the Internal Revenue Service on an annual basis. Please be sure to let us know if you have a change of address so that we can get your 1099 form and your redemption checks to the correct address.

Copies of the Colorado State Statutes are available online or at your local library. We are unable to provide copies of the statutes at this time.

The El Paso County tax lien sale will be held Oct. 22nd, 2025 on the internet at El Paso.coloradotaxsale.com. The sale will be administered by RealAuction, and is conducted with the goal of fairness and efficiency. Questions regarding the online sale should be directed to RealAuction at 877-361-7325 or emailed to customerservice@realauction.com. Any questions regarding the tax sale process or the property taxes being sold should be directed to the El Paso County Treasurer’s Office at 719-520-7900.

All tax liens on real property are sold at the online auction with a premium bid, those premium bids are not paid back to the investor, nor do they earn redemption interest. The interest rate for the 2025 Tax Lien Sale will be 14% per annum, or 1.17% per month. Successful bidders at the online sale pay the total advertised price (which includes the delinquent tax, interest, advertising fee and a $16 certificate fee), as well as a premium bid.

A preliminary list of the tax liens available for sale will be posted on September 24th on ElPaso – RealTaxLien (coloradotaxsale.com) and will be updated routinely through the morning of the tax lien sale.

All potential bidders must register before the sale date, which is the official start of the sale. Registration will include the completion of an IRS required W-9 form, as well as acceptance of a User Agreement. To begin bidding you will be required to make a deposit of at least 10% of what you plan to spend at the tax lien sale. Deposits and final payments can be made by ACH (electronic check). We encourage you to register as soon as the delinquent property list is available, so you have time to do research and make a determination of your bid.

Registration will close on October 15th, 2025.

Realauction will provide several webinar training sessions to introduce investors to our online tax lien sale. The webinars will give step-by-step instructions about participating in the tax lien sale online.

**Online Bidder Training Dates will be published once they are available**

To register, please call Realauction at 1-877-361-7325 or visit https://www.realauction.com/training. You must register with Realauction to attend the webinar.

Following the tax lien sale, final payment will be initiated via ACH using the banking information used for the bidder’s most current settled deposit. Successful bidders will receive a copy of the tax lien certificate of purchase for each property. All original certificates are held in safekeeping by the El Paso County Treasurer’s Office.

The tax lien sale Certificate of Purchase is only a lien on the property and does not change ownership of the property. The Certificate of Purchase is valid for 15 years from the date of the sale. Interest is earned at the rate stated on the certificate with portions of calendar months considered as whole months. Premiums do not earn interest.

After obtaining a certificate of purchase at the tax sale, if you wish to assign it to a different investor, you can do so by contacting our office at 719-520-7900 Please note that if the person you are assigning your certificate(s) to is not already an investor with El Paso County, they will need to complete a W-9 form and submit it to our office.

Subsequent Year’s Taxes After August 1 of each year, all tax lien sale certificate holders have first option to purchase any subsequent year’s taxes that remain unpaid. These tax liens will be endorsed onto the original certificate at the same rate of return.

At anytime, at least three (3) years from the date of the sale of a tax lien, a lawful holder may file an Application for a Public Auction of a Certificate of Option for Treasurer’s Deed. Applications may be obtained by emailing our office at trsweb@elpasoco.com.

Processing Timeline Leading up to Sale:

• As soon as practicable following the receipt of an Application for a Public Auction, the application will be reviewed to determine whether it complies with the requirements, and either accept or deny the application.
• If the Application for Public Auction is accepted, the original application and the original tax lien sale certificate of purchase will be recorded with the County Clerk & Recorder within ten (10) business days following the acceptance.
• No more than thirty (30) calendar days after recording the Application for Public Auction, we will mail an initial notice to the property address of record.
• As soon as reasonably practicable, title work will then be ordered.
• No more than twenty (20) calendar days after receiving the results of the title search, we will create a mailing list (including the Lawful Holder) and mail a Known Interested Party (KIP) Notice to all persons on the mailing list. This notice will include the first & last publication dates.
• No less than thirty (30) calendar days after receiving the results of the title search, and if the property valuation is more than $500.00, we will publish the KIP Notice for three consecutive weeks with the Gazette.
• If the property value is less than $500.00, publication is not required.
• No less than forty-five (45) but no more than sixty (60) calendar days prior to the public auction, we will post a KIP Notice on the property and on our website.
• No less than twenty-eight (28) calendar days prior to the public auction, we will post the KIP Notice outside our main office entryway.
• The public auction will be held no more than one hundred twenty-five (125) but no less than one hundred ten (110) calendar days after the date of the first publication of the KIP Notice, or the date of mailing of the KIP notice if publication is not required.

Each year unpaid taxes on real estate, mobile homes and special assessment properties are sold to investors who attend the sale at the time determined by the Treasurer. Investing in tax liens through purchase at the tax lien sale is just that, an investment. You purchase the tax lien, NOT the property. Very few deed transfers occur as a result of a tax lien sale.

Tax sales are established by state statute and held to enable the various authorities and county government to continue to operate though some taxes are unpaid.

The tax sale date is subject to state statute and is held after the delinquent tax listing is published in a local paper for three weeks

Investors should check with individual counties for information on when and where their sales will be held.

Any person who has monies to invest and is not an employee of the county or a relative of any county employee. Monies can be tied up for an indefinite period of time.

Each year the Colorado Banking Commission determines the rate of return. The annual percentage rate is set at nine points above the federal discount rate for September 1 of that year, rounding up to the nearest full percentage. The interest rate for tax liens sold in 2025 will be 14% per annum, or 1.17% per month.

A property list of all outstanding 2024 (payable in 2025) property taxes and special assessments will be available through the publisher, The Gazette, after publication.

Publication dates are:

Wednesday, September 10th

Wednesday, September 17th

Wednesday, September 24th

Special assessment liens will be sold with corresponding real estate liens, if both are delinquent. The real estate parcels will be listed in the exact order of the sale and will include tax schedule number, property location, legal description and the total amount due.

It is important to remember the element of risk involved in the purchase of tax liens. The purchase of tax sale liens of properties under the control of Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) and those affected by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) could possibly result in the loss of interest. Identifying any potential problems in this area is impossible for the Treasurer’s Office. Please conduct your own investigation to reduce the possibility of loss of interest to you.

Parcels are subject to federal, state and local government regulations including, but not limited to, land use and environmental regulations.

The list of delinquent taxes that are available to purchase at the Tax Lien Sale are advertised for three consecutive weeks prior to the sale in the Colorado Springs Gazette (September 10th, September 17th, September 24th) .

These lists are provided for informational purposes only, if you have any questions please contact the El Paso County Treasurer’s Office at 719-520-7900.

• • Delinquent Real Property (prior years example)
  • Delinquent Mobile Homes (will not be advertised 2025)
  • Delinquent Personal Property (prior years example)