Land · Pennsylvania tax sale guide

Pennsylvania tax sales by county

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Pennsylvania runs the most confusing tax sale system in the country, and the confusion is the opportunity. Every delinquent parcel can pass through three stages, upset, judicial and repository, and the title you get is different at each one: at upset you buy the taxes and keep the liens; at judicial and repository the court system clears them. County pages state dates and lists and rarely explain which stage a parcel sits in. These pages do. On November 9, 2026, one tracker recorded 1,041 upcoming Pennsylvania tax sales across 11 counties, with Philadelphia alone offering 619 parcels in a single sale.

This page set covers the top 30 counties by documented sale volume and population. Each county page carries the three stages on that county's own calendar, the selling office, the registration and deposit rules, the payment deadline, and the repository terms, verified against the county or sheriff source. The repository layer matters most: it is year round inventory that no national list seller presents county by county, in the gaps between the September upset season and the judicial sales.

Two counties in this set sit outside the bureau system by law. Philadelphia (first class) and Allegheny (second class) never adopted the Tax Claim Bureau model; their delinquent tax sales run through their sheriffs, monthly, and their pages explain that system instead of forcing the three stage frame onto it.

Verify before you go: bureaus and sheriffs can move a date, change terms, or pull parcels at any time, and owners can pay and stop a sale at any point before it starts. The official sale notice is the final word.

The 30 counties

Each row links to that county's own page: the stages on its calendar, selling office, registration, deposit and payment rules, repository terms, and sources. Where a county's 2026 dated sales are complete, the next event shown is the live repository.

The three stages, and what title you get at each

• Delinquent taxes go to the Tax Claim Bureau. When real estate taxes stay unpaid, the claims are returned to the county Tax Claim Bureau, which collects for the county, the municipality and the school district and runs the sales (Real Estate Tax Sale Law, 72 P.S. Section 5860.101 and following). Two counties in this set are outside the system by law: Philadelphia (a county of the first class) and Allegheny (second class). Their delinquent tax sales run through their sheriffs instead, and their pages say how.
• Stage one: the upset sale. The bureau must schedule the upset sale no earlier than the second Monday of September and before October 1, and may continue it within the calendar year (Section 5860.601). The opening price is the upset price (Section 5860.605): the tax claims and interest, any other tax claims and judgments, all accrued taxes including the current year, municipal claims, and the record costs and costs of sale. No bid below the upset price can be accepted. An upset buyer takes the property subject to mortgages, liens and ground rents that were not part of the upset price (Section 5860.609): the taxes are paid, the liens may not be.
• Stage two: the judicial sale. What does not sell at upset can be exposed again at a judicial sale, which the bureau petitions the Court of Common Pleas to order (Sections 5860.610 and 5860.612). This is the prize of the system: a judicial sale conveys the property freed and cleared of all tax and municipal claims, mortgages, liens, charges and estates, except separately taxed ground rents. Judicial lists draw the serious buyers precisely because the court order clears the title.
• Stage three: the repository. What does not sell at judicial sale is placed in the repository for unsold properties, and the bureau must keep the list available to the public (Section 5860.626). At any time of year, the bureau may accept an offer of any price for a repository parcel, with the written consent of every taxing district where the property sits and without court approval (Section 5860.627). Repository deeds convey the same cleared title as judicial deeds, except separately taxed ground rents. Counties set their own minimum bids, forms and fees; each county page carries its own.
• The owner's rights end at the sale. An owner can pay the claim and stop the process at any point before the sale, including by an installment agreement with the bureau. After an upset or judicial sale there is no redemption: the owner's remaining route is objections to the bureau's return in court, on the confirmation timetable in the terms table below. Philadelphia is the exception in this set: an owner-occupier there can redeem within nine months after the sheriff's deed is acknowledged (see the Philadelphia page).

One Pennsylvania fact decides most bids: the stage is the title. Price an upset parcel like a tax payment with a property attached, and a judicial or repository parcel like a cleared deed, because that is what the statute makes them.

Research the parcels before you bid

A sale list gives you the parcel, 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 the country, searchable by address, owner, or county, including parcels that never reach a sale list.

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Get the alert, not just the calendar.

The dates on these pages are the free layer. The Pine membership is the paid layer, proven in New York: members pick their counties, get alerts when a sale is scheduled or a list posts, and receive the full property list with the analysis already done, upset price or minimum bid, assessed value and equity screen on every parcel, with the stage marked on each one. Pennsylvania counties open from the interest list first, in the order readers join it.

Keep going

Once a deadline puts you in a sale, the Land Investor Due Diligence Toolkit is the checklist and bid worksheet to run on each parcel before you bid.