Land · New Jersey tax sale guide

Hope Township tax lien sale, New Jersey

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Hope states its sale day in its audit, in one sentence: the last tax sale was held on January 31, 2019 and was complete. The same audit carries the township's lien tabulation across three years and a schedule of premiums held from its sales. This set carries no Warren County page. Its 2020 census population is 1,835, printed in the township's own 2021 and 2023 financial statements and read in the New Jersey Department of Labor municipal census table; no Census QuickFacts page exists for a population below 5,000.

Selling office: Township of Hope Tax Collector (Stephen J. Lance), Hope

Next sale: Thursday, January 31, 2019 (most recent dated sale published). That date is the held sale the township's own 2019 audit states; no later sale day is published in the township sources read.

Hope answers the sale question in its audit, so start there and bring the collector the parcels the audit cannot price.

Dates and deadlines

The dated sale	Thursday, January 31, 2019, held, stated in the township's own 2019 audit, whose General Comments read that the last tax sale was held on January 31, 2019 and was complete, and that inspection of the tax sale certificates on file showed all certificates from tax sales available for audit.
The lien figures	The same audit tabulates tax title liens of $102,078 at the end of 2019, $100,888 at the end of 2018 and $198,548 at the end of 2017, with delinquent taxes of $43,743, $45,537 and $70,487 in the same years and total delinquent of $145,821, 2.26 percent of the 2019 tax levy. The number of tax title liens receivable stood at 5 in 2019 and 2018 and 7 in 2017. The township's own 2018 audit renders the December 31, 2018 lien balance as $98,820 in its lien schedule, a different figure from the 2019 audit's tabulation for the same date; each document's figure stands as its own, and the two are not merged here.
The premium schedule	The township audits carry a Schedule of Reserve for Tax Sale Premiums among their trust fund statements, with tax sale premiums received and paid across the years under audit.
The sale type answers	The township's own 2023 financial statement answers that the township did not conduct an accelerated tax sale or a tax levy sale. Those answers speak to the type of sale only; they say nothing about a standard tax sale and are not read as one here.
Next sale	Not published as a specific date beyond the January 2019 sale above.
Sale track	Not published as a label; the township audit describes the standard tax sale of liens on delinquent taxes it conducts.
Registration	Registration terms are not published in the Hope sources read.
Deposit	Deposit terms are not published in the Hope sources read.
Bidding and payment	Not published beyond the audit above in the Hope sources read; the state frame governs a township sale itself, with the rate bid down from 18 percent and premium bidding below 1 percent, as set out below.
Redemption	Through the Tax Collector until a Superior Court judgment bars the right. The money side, interest at the bid rate, subsequent payments and the tiered penalty, is set out in the terms table below, on the state frame.
Struck off certificates	Nothing published in the sources read. Under the state frame a lien with no purchaser is struck off to the municipality at 18 percent and may later be assigned under 54:5-113 or sold at public sale under 54:5-114.1 and 54:5-114.2.
Format	Not stated for the 2019 sale in the Hope sources read.
Selling office	Township of Hope Tax Collector (Stephen J. Lance), named Collector and Tax Search Officer in the Officials in Office roster of the township's own 2019 audit, with Karen M. Bartlett-Lance named as Assistant Tax Collector in the same roster. That naming is the latest one in the Hope sources read, from the period under audit in 2019.

Sources: Township of Hope, Report of Audit for 2019 and Annual Financial Statements (hopetownship.com). NJ Division of Local Government Services, Elements of Tax Sales in New Jersey. Confirm with the selling office before relying on any date on this page: sales move, terms change, and parcels are pulled up to sale day.

Research Hope Township parcels before you bid

A sale list gives you the parcels, the date, and the opening terms. It does not give you the owner, the value, or the rest of the picture: liens, foreclosure status, and parcel history. PropertyRadar is the data platform for that layer. It carries owner records, assessed and market values, foreclosure and tax data, and property history for parcels across Hope Township, searchable by address, owner, or county, including parcels that never reach a sale list.

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How New Jersey tax sales work

Nobody at the county sells anything. Under NJSA 54:5-19 the tax collector of each municipality sells. Counties in New Jersey assess nothing for this process and run no sale; every date, list, platform and deposit rule on these pages belongs to a town, not to the county named at the top.
What is sold is a certificate, a lien, not the property. The Division of Local Government Services states it plainly: at the tax sale, title to the delinquent property itself is not sold; what is sold is a tax sale certificate. The owner keeps the property and is not evicted.
Two sale tracks run on the statute's calendar. A standard sale is held in the fiscal year following the year of delinquency. An accelerated sale reaches charges in arrears on the 11th day of the eleventh month of the fiscal year, conducted no earlier than the last month of that year, which is why December accelerated sales exist. A municipality may run both.
Bidding is the rate down from eighteen percent, then premium. Under 54:5-32 the lien is struck off to whoever takes the lowest rate of interest, never above 18 percent. When a bidder offers less than 1 percent or no interest, premium bidding takes over: the winner pays the amount due plus the highest premium. The premium goes to the municipality, earns no interest, is returned if the owner redeems, and escheats to the municipality if the certificate is neither redeemed nor foreclosed within five years.
Redemption runs through the collector until a court bars it. The owner, heirs, a prior certificate holder, a mortgagee or an occupant may redeem at any time until the right is barred by a Superior Court judgment (54:5-54, 54:5-86), paying the sale amount with interest at the bid rate, the holder's subsequent lien payments and expenses, and the tiered penalty in 54:5-61: 2 percent over 200 dollars, 4 percent over 5,000, 6 percent over 10,000.
Foreclosure has two clocks, and assignment moves you to the faster one. A private holder may file in Superior Court after two years from the sale; a municipality, or its assignee or transferee, may file after six months (54:5-86), and a municipality may proceed in rem where six months have run and 21 months of general land taxes remain unpaid (54:5-104.32, 54:5-104.34). Since July 10, 2024, P.L.2024, c.39 has revised the process so an owner can protect remaining equity, so foreclosure is no longer the automatic equity transfer older guides describe.
Unsold liens are struck off to the municipality at eighteen percent. The municipality may later sell those certificates by private assignment under 54:5-113, for not less than the liens by governing body resolution, or at public sale under 54:5-114.1 and 54:5-114.2, the second permitting sales below the amount due. That assignment market is New Jersey's leftover channel, and it is municipal, never county run.

How buying works in Hope Township

Hope preparation runs through the audit first. The sale day, the lien counts and the premium schedule sit in the township's own financial record, and the liens here run larger than the delinquent taxes behind them, which tells a bidder that certificates in this township age on the books.

The rate is a giveaway on any lien worth having. On contested certificates the interest rate is bid to zero in the first minutes and the real bidding is the premium, which earns nothing and sits with the municipality for up to five years. The disciplined bid is set by the property and the foreclosure timeline, never by the rate.
Liens outlast the taxes that made them here. Hope ended 2017 with liens near $200,000 against delinquent taxes near $70,000, so a bidder is pricing old paper and its foreclosure timeline, not a fresh list.

Terms: what a bid actually costs

Deposit, Hope Township	Not published; no Hope sale notice carrying a deposit figure was found among the sources behind this page.
Payment, Hope Township	Payment terms are not published in the Hope sources read, and the township tax office governs payment for a Hope sale.
What is sold	A tax sale certificate: a lien on the property for the taxes and municipal charges sold, recorded against the property. The property itself is not sold, the owner is not evicted, and the certificate holder's road to the property runs through redemption failing and a Superior Court foreclosure.
The interest ceiling	18 percent per year, the maximum in 54:5-32. Bidding opens at 18 percent and the rate is bid down. The rate the winner takes is the rate the owner pays on redemption, and on contested liens in the publishing towns the rate is routinely bid to zero, which is where the premium takes over.
The premium	When a bidder offers less than 1 percent or no interest, the lien is struck off to whoever pays the amount due plus the highest premium. The premium is paid to the municipality and held by it: it earns the buyer no interest, it is returned if the owner redeems, and it escheats to the municipality if the certificate is neither redeemed nor foreclosed within five years. Model every premium dollar at zero percent, because that is what it earns.
Redemption money	The sum paid at the sale with interest from the sale date at the rate bid; after the certificate issues, plus the holder's expenses and subsequent municipal liens paid under 54:5-59 and 54:5-60; plus the tiered penalty in 54:5-61, 2 percent where the certificate exceeds 200 dollars, 4 percent above 5,000 dollars and 6 percent above 10,000 dollars. A municipality may separately fix a year end penalty up to 6 percent on delinquencies over 10,000 dollars under 54:4-67.
How long redemption really lasts	Until a Superior Court judgment bars it. There is no self expiring redemption date: the operative clocks are the foreclosure filing clocks, two years from the sale for a private holder, six months for a municipality or its assignee, plus the life of the court case. An owner facing a private holder has at least two years; an owner facing a municipal assignee may have far less.
The deed path	Foreclosure of the right of redemption in Superior Court, Chancery Division, or a municipal in rem action under 54:5-104.32 where its conditions are met. Since P.L.2024, c.39 (July 10, 2024) the process protects the owner's remaining equity, so the pre-2024 outcome, foreclosure simply transferring all equity to the holder, is not current law and no 2026 page should describe it as such.

The leftover channel: struck off certificates and municipal assignment

For Hope the township sources behind this page publish nothing about struck off certificates or assignment sales beyond the audit above. Under the state frame a township lien with no purchaser is struck off to the township at 18 percent and may later be sold by private assignment under 54:5-113, for not less than the liens by governing body resolution, or at public sale under 54:5-114.1 and 54:5-114.2, the second permitting sales below the amount due. The assignee of a municipal certificate inherits the municipality's six month foreclosure clock under 54:5-86, measured from the original sale date.

Before you bid

Start with the town, because there is no county list. Every fact that matters, the date, the list, the platform, the deposit, lives with one municipal tax collector. The county page tells you which towns publish and what they published; the towns that publish nothing are a telephone call, and no website, this one included, can substitute for it.
Redeem and pay only through the collector. Redemption money goes to the tax collector for the holder's use, and the collector's figure is the redemption figure. Never pay a certificate holder directly on their own number, and record your certificate with the county clerk within 90 days of the sale to protect the lien.
Know which clock your seller gives you. A certificate bought at the sale carries a two year wait before foreclosure; the same certificate bought by assignment from the municipality can be foreclosed on the six month municipal clock from the original sale date. The channel you buy through is a term of the deal, priced like one.
Set the maximum before the sale opens. The free Max-Bid Calculator below works backwards from your exit value to the highest bid you can pay, with the costs shown. In premium territory the maximum is a property decision, not a yield decision.

The municipal pages in this set

One page per selling office, each verified against its own municipal sources. New Jersey has 566 municipalities and every one sells through its own tax collector; this set is the five hundred ten largest municipalities by population. Warren County has no county page in this set; the New Jersey hub carries the county sets.

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