El Paso County, CO
Online lien sale on RealAuction — deposit, ACH details and acknowledgement due Oct 27 at 2 p.m.
El Paso County's annual tax lien sale, covering 2025 taxes payable in 2026, takes place online through RealAuction on October 28, 2026, with lots closing on the schedule set in the auction system. Registration, deposits and bidding opened on September 30. To take part, a bidder has to finish three things by 2:00 p.m. MST on October 27: submit a deposit, enter the ACH account where redemption payments should be sent, and complete the county's participation acknowledgement. The list ran in the Colorado Springs Gazette on September 16, 23 and 30. A parcel that gets paid during that cycle stays in the printed list and is only removed from RealAuction, so the auction site, not the newspaper, is the list to work from.
The certificate is a recorded lien that earns interest; it gives no ownership, possession, use, improvement rights or access to the property. For the 2026 sale the rate is 13% a year, accruing at 1.08% a month for as long as the lien stays unpaid. When a lien redeems, the treasurer pays back the taxes you bought plus the interest accrued from the sale date — it does not refund premium bids. If the following year's taxes also go unpaid, holders are offered the option in August to endorse them onto the certificates they already hold. The redemption period is three years from the year of the sale: certificates sold in 2023 qualify for a treasurer's deed application in 2026, and Colorado only requires that the original lien stay unpaid for those three years, not three years of delinquency in a row. Interest earned is reported to the IRS, and the treasurer sends each buyer a 1099 every January.
Colorado rules at a glance
Colorado's rate is nine points above the federal discount rate, set each September 1 by the State Bank Commissioner (C.R.S. 39-12-103): 13% for liens sold from October 1, 2026. Bidders compete on a premium that goes to the county and earns no interest (C.R.S. 39-11-115). From August 1 of the third calendar year after the sale the holder can apply for a treasurer's deed, which now means a public auction (C.R.S. art. 11.5); the owner can redeem until seven days before it.
The statute, the bidding and what goes wrong for new buyers are on the Colorado page; every sale date we have sourced for El Paso County is on the El Paso County page.
Property & tax profile
The median homeowner in El Paso County pays $1,874 a year in property tax — below the Colorado median of $2,602 (U.S.: $3,119). That is roughly what a typical home here owes after one missed year — about the face value of a one-year certificate, before interest, fees and any premium. Homes with a mortgage pay a median of $1,931; homes owned outright, $1,722.
On a home with a mortgage, the lender has its own reason to pay a delinquent tax bill: the tax lien outranks the mortgage, and a tax deed can wipe out the loan. On a home owned outright, nobody but the owner — or the heirs — has that reason. In El Paso County, 28.4% of owner-occupied homes are owned outright (Colorado: 30.6%, U.S.: 39.4%). About the same as the state as a whole.
4.4% of all housing units in El Paso County are vacant. The figure that matters for a lien buyer is the Census “other vacant” category — not for rent, not for sale, not a holiday home, but a catch-all that includes foreclosures, homes held up by legal proceedings or family reasons, homes needing repairs, and abandoned ones. Here it is 1.4% of all units (Colorado: 1.7%, U.S.: 3.6%). Close to the state rate.
Half of the homes in El Paso County were built in or before 1989 (Colorado: in or before 1988). The typical tax bill is 2.1% of the median household income of $90,363 (Colorado: 2.7%).
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020-2024 5-year estimates (tables B25077, B25103, B25081, B25002, B25004, B25035, B19013) — see the figures on data.census.gov. Survey estimates with margins of error; anything too uncertain to state is left out.
Before you bid: Miss any of the three October 27 requirements and you can't bid on the 28th. Ask for ACH redemption payments at [email protected], and confirm anything else with the El Paso County Treasurer at 719-520-7900 — the buyer, not the county, is responsible for judging the property behind each lien.
Official source: treasurer.elpasoco.com — checked October 4, 2026
More sales: 41 other county sales are on the calendar in October 2026 — see them by date; or the upcoming sales in Colorado.
This page reflects publicly posted county auction notices as of publication and is general information, not financial or legal advice. Sale details can change — always confirm current terms with the county directly.