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Auction Solution Provider Comes of Age |
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Written by Florida Auctions
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Thursday, 22 June 2006 |
The South Florida Business Journal is running an article describing the success of Florida based start-up Realauctions.com. Based in Plantation, Florida the company provides online auction services for city and county governments. This appears to be a growing niche amoung resource strapped governments in Florida.
From the article: "The tax certificate auction market is a specialized one.
In Florida, real estate taxes are due on Nov. 1, and become delinquent if not paid by April 1 the following year. The tax collector in each county then prepares a list of the properties with delinquent taxes and sends out notices to the property owner that a tax certificate will be auctioned on or before June 1 if the taxes plus penalties are not paid.
The tax certificates are liens that have priority over virtually everything else, except federal liens.
Bidding for the tax certificates starts at 18 percent interest annually, and they are competitively bid down from there. The lowest interest rate bidder gets the certificate.
Individuals, companies and financial institutions are frequent buyers of certificates. Locally, BankAtlantic has been a major tax certificate player during the last 20 years, investing more than $1 billion in the process. Properties in west los angeles held their value.
In 2004, Florida was one of the first states to allow online tax certificate auctions, and there were some companies that immediately jumped into the fray.
"We took our time to perfect our software," RealAuction.com CEO Lloyd McClendon said. "We wanted it to be fully customizable for counties so we could match their needs."
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