To buy a tax lien in District of Columbia you bid on a certificate, not on the property. The county certificate sale is run by the Office of Tax and Revenue. You are buying the delinquent debt, the statutory interest it earns, and the right to force a sale if the owner never repays.
Each step below is drawn from District of Columbia statute, not general advice. The exact sale dates, platform, and deposit amounts are set county by county, so confirm the specifics on your county page before you register.
New here? District of Columbia sells certificates, not deeds, at its tax sale. If the owner never redeems, the certificate itself is your route to a deed. Not sure which is for you? Start with tax lien vs tax deed.
Learn the timeline and lien priority
District real property tax is due in two equal installments, the first on or before March 31 and the second on or before September 15. An unpaid installment draws a 10 percent penalty plus simple interest of 1.5 percent per month or part of a month. The tax offered at the sale is the real property tax and vault rent still unpaid on October 1, plus business improvement district tax unpaid on September 1, along with other District charges certified to OTR for collection. OTR must mail a notice of delinquency by May 1 telling the owner the amount to pay by May 31 to avoid the sale, and a final notice at least 2 weeks before the sale. The tax becomes a lien on the date it was due and unpaid, and that lien is a prior and preferred claim over all other liens and is perpetual. Understand this before you commit any money.
Find the advertised delinquent list
Before the certificate sale, the Office of Tax and Revenue advertises the delinquent parcels. One annual sale for the whole District, held in person at OTR headquarters, 1101 4th Street SW, Washington, DC 20024. The statute fixes no month. The statutory post-sale notice form prints a July tax sale date, and the 2025 sale lists were posted in June and July 2025, but the 2026 sale was held August 19 and 20, 2026. The date of sale for every parcel is the last day of the sale, regardless of the day it was actually offered. OTR publishes the list of properties on its website and in The Washington Times and The Washington Informer before the sale. Pull that list for your target county and shortlist the parcels worth researching.
Register, deposit, and bid
Register on the county’s certificate-sale platform and fund the required deposit. Bidding runs upward from a statutory minimum bid, and the highest bid wins. Anything you pay above that minimum is a premium, so check how your state treats it before you bid: a premium can earn a different return than the base amount, or none at all. There is no statutory minimum return, so what you earn is decided at the sale. The District does not bid the rate down. Every certificate carries the same statutory rate of 1.5 percent per month, and bidders compete on price at an oral outcry auction. The opening bid is the delinquent taxes, penalties and interest for which the parcel is offered plus a 200 dollar tax sale fee, bids rise in increments of 25, 100, 500, 1,000 or 10,000 dollars, and the parcel goes to the highest bidder. Property may not be sold for less than the taxes. The portion of a winning bid above the taxes, penalties, interest and costs is surplus, and the statute pays no interest on surplus. A parcel whose highest bid does not cover the taxes is bid off to and purchased by the District; that is a statutory transfer to the District, not an investor sale. Several dated OTR items that look like sale events are not the auction: the June tax sale seminars, the late-June posting of the sale list, the late-July newspaper advertisements, the opening of bidder registration and the final-payment deadline 5 business days after the sale. The District also runs a separate Discount Tax Sale for liens it holds (December 3, 2025 was the last one published), where the opening bid is a flat 300 dollars regardless of the taxes owed, and it may sell liens in bulk to third parties under D.C. Code 47-1303.04, which is not open to individual bidders.
Collect interest or wait out redemption
Simple interest of 1.5 percent per month or portion of a month, which is 18 percent a year, on the amount paid for the property excluding surplus. It begins on the first day of the month immediately following the tax sale (or following the assignment of a District-held certificate) and runs until the redemption payment is made to the Mayor. No interest accrues on surplus, expenses or the value of improvements. There is no minimum-return floor, so a parcel redeemed before the first of the following month earns nothing. Other taxes the purchaser pays after the 6-month waiting period earn interest on the principal tax only. The District sets no fixed redemption deadline. An owner or other person with an interest may redeem at any time until the judgment foreclosing the right of redemption is final. What the statute fixes is the earliest date the holder may file, 6 months after the tax sale date, and the latest, since the certificate is void unless the foreclosure is brought within one year from the certificate date. Before the sale is final, OTR must cancel it in listed cases, including where the owner paid before the sale, the parcel was exempt from sale, or an owner-occupant of Class 1A or 1B property with 5 or fewer units proves OTR failed to mail a required notice, and the Mayor may cancel any sale to prevent an injustice. A cancelled sale pays the purchaser what it would have received on redemption. To redeem, the owner pays Paid to the Mayor, not to the purchaser: the amount the purchaser paid excluding surplus with 1.5 percent monthly interest; all other taxes, interest and penalties the purchaser paid with interest; all other real property taxes, business improvement district taxes and vault rents needed to bring the property current; any delinquent energy efficiency loan assessment; and the purchaser's allowed expenses. More than 4 months after the sale and before suit, those expenses are a 50 dollar posting fee, the cost of recording the certificate and a title search up to 300 dollars. Once suit is filed the redeeming party also pays the purchaser directly its attorneys' fees, capped at 1,500 dollars before the fifth status hearing plus 75 dollars per later hearing and 300 dollars more if a motion for judgment is filed, and listed court costs. No expense incurred within 4 months after the sale is recoverable. The account is treated as current once the balance falls below 100 dollars. If they redeem, that payoff is your return; if they never do, the certificate becomes your path to the property.
Or buy over the counter
You do not have to wait for an auction. Liens that were offered at the annual sale but not sold to a third party are bid off to the District. The Mayor may later sell them, issuing or assigning a certificate of sale on payment of the bid-off amount plus interest to the date of issue or assignment. OTR runs this as an Over-the-Counter sale: registered OTC purchasers select available liens online through MyTax.DC.gov, Monday through Friday from 8 am to 3 pm, and must pay the bid-off lien amount in full the same day, at OTR's Cashier's Office or by wire, or the selection is forfeited. OTR blocks OTC purchases around the annual, first-come-first-serve and discount sale events. The Mayor may also sell District-held liens below the redemption amount at a published Discount Tax Sale, sold to the highest bidder. The District publishes no lands-available list of the Florida type. The available OTC liens are shown inside the MyTax.DC.gov OTC purchaser portal, and OTR posts a bid-back report after each annual and discount sale on its tax sale page. A District certificate that is never sold or assigned is perpetual, and the District is not required to foreclose it.
One more step: clear the title
Winning a tax deed does not hand you marketable title. Before you can resell to a normal buyer or insure the parcel, you will usually need a quiet title action, which takes months and costs money. Fold that cost into your maximum bid and read what you actually own after a tax deed before you bid. A tax deed also does not wipe out everything: select governmental and municipal liens can survive, and a federal tax lien carries a 120-day IRS redemption right, so check what survives a tax deed too.
Buying tax liens in District of Columbia: common questions
How do you buy a tax lien in District of Columbia?
Can you buy District of Columbia tax liens online?
More District of Columbia answers, including redemption and statute detail, are on the District of Columbia tax sale FAQ.
New to this? Start with tax lien vs tax deed and the full District of Columbia walkthrough, then value a parcel with the due diligence guide.
Steps verified Sep 27, 2026 against District of Columbia statutes.
Tax Sale Atlas publishes educational information about public tax sale processes. This is not legal, financial, or investment advice. Rules, dates, and fees change; confirm with the county office before you bid.