Land · New Jersey tax sale guide

Matawan borough tax lien sale, New Jersey

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Matawan's sale shows up in its paperwork after the fact, in redemption after redemption. Borough council minutes across 2012 to 2019 record tax sale certificates sold to outside holders at premium and later redeemed through the borough, with premiums running into the thousands of dollars on single liens. The borough code charges the Tax Collector to arrange for and conduct sales of real estate for delinquent taxes as necessary and as directed. No borough sale notice stating a day, a room or a sale site appears in the borough sources behind this page, and no certificate number in those minutes states a sale date. The borough audit synopsis carries collections of delinquent taxes and tax title liens of $364,960.25 for 2024. Its 2020 census population is 9,565 (Census QuickFacts).

Selling office: Borough of Matawan Tax Collector (Michael J. Schnurr), 201 Broad Street, Matawan

Next sale: Not published. The borough minutes record certificates sold and redeemed across many years, and no borough notice behind this page states a sale day.

Ask the borough Tax Collector for the sale day, because the borough papers a long run of certificate sales in its minutes and no dated sale morning.

Dates and deadlines

The pattern in the minutes	Borough council minutes from 2012 to 2019 record redemptions of tax sale certificates sold to outside holders at premium, including a $6,700.00 premium on one 2013-series certificate, a $6,400.00 premium on a 2016-series certificate and an $11,200.00 premium on a 2018-series certificate. The minutes are meeting records; their meeting days are not sale days.
The code duty	The borough code charges the Tax Collector to arrange for and conduct sales of real estate for delinquent taxes as necessary and as directed by the borough.
The certificate note	Certificate numbers in the minutes are identifiers for single liens in redemption paperwork. No sale date is stated or taken from any certificate number on this page.
Next sale	Not published as a specific date. No borough sale notice stating a sale day appears in the borough sources read.
Sale track	Not published. No borough document read labels a Matawan sale standard or accelerated.
Registration	Not published in the sources read.
Deposit	Not published in the sources read.
Bidding and payment	Not published in the sources read. The state frame governs a borough 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 published. No borough source read states a venue, an electronic platform or an electronic sale authorisation.
Selling office	Borough of Matawan Tax Collector (Michael J. Schnurr, MPA, CTC), 201 Broad Street, Matawan, NJ 07747, phone 732-566-3898 extension 609, per the borough Tax Collector page. A 2019 minutes signature names an earlier holder; the current page governs.

Sources: Borough of Matawan, council minutes 2012 to 2019, borough code, Tax Collector page and 2024 Audit Synopsis (matawanborough.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 Matawan borough 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 Matawan borough, 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 Matawan borough

Matawan preparation is a question to the tax office backed by the minutes. The minutes prove the borough sells liens to outside holders at real premiums year after year, so the bidder's work is to get the next sale day and list from the collector rather than to guess either from the redemption record.

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.
Premiums in the minutes are history, not a price guide. A premium paid on one Matawan lien in one year says what that lien drew that year; it prices nothing about the next list.

Terms: what a bid actually costs

Deposit, Matawan borough	Not published. No borough sale notice carrying a deposit figure was found among the borough sources behind this page.
Payment, Matawan borough	Not published in the sources read. A borough sale notice, when Matawan publishes one, is the document that will govern payment.
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 Matawan the borough sources behind this page publish nothing about struck off certificates or assignment sales beyond the redemptions recorded in the minutes. Under the state frame a borough lien with no purchaser is struck off to the borough 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 four hundred seventy largest municipalities by population. The county's other municipalities are aggregated on the Monmouth County page.

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