Land · Wisconsin tax sale guide

Brown County tax sales, Wisconsin

Verified

Brown County's own board records are the source for this page: they show parcels acquired by tax deed, including parcels acquired by foreclosure under s. 75.521, put out for bid with minimum starting bids, sold through the Wisconsin Surplus online auction (documented auction endings include May 28, 2021, August 4, 2021, July 22, 2022 and November 1, 2019), and approved parcel by parcel by the County Board. Unsold parcels are simply put back out at lower minimums; one documented parcel returned at a 1,000 dollar minimum after failing at 128,000 dollars. No dated 2026 auction was verified in the records read, and no standing annual date is published, so this page gives the pattern and flags the calendar as unverified.

Selling office: Brown County Treasurer

Next sale: No dated sale verified; the pattern is periodic Wisconsin Surplus auctions as tax deed inventory accumulates. Brown County does not publish a fixed annual sale date in the records read. Auctions are noticed as batches: watch the Treasurer's tax deed postings and the Wisconsin Surplus auction calendar, and expect County Board approval to follow the auction close by weeks, not days.

As of November 9, 2026, no dated Brown County auction was verified. The working pattern is a batch auction when the Treasurer has deed inventory, followed by board approval and re-listing of the leftovers; the 2027 working move is to watch the Treasurer's postings and the Wisconsin Surplus calendar rather than a fixed date.

Dates and deadlines

Sources: Brown County Board of Supervisors proceedings, Treasurer tax deed parcel sales (browncountywi.gov). Brown County Board of Supervisors proceedings, July 20, 2022, Wisconsin Surplus auction sales. Wisconsin Statutes s. 75.521, Foreclosure of tax liens by action in rem. Wisconsin Statutes s. 75.36, County acquisition and sale of property. 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 Brown County 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 Brown County, searchable by address, owner, or county, including parcels that never reach a sale list.

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How Wisconsin tax sales work

• Delinquent taxes accrue at eighteen percent a year, and nobody auctions anything. Under s. 74.47 unpaid Wisconsin taxes bear interest at one percent per month plus a penalty of one half of one percent per month. There is no lien sale at this stage, in any county, to anyone.
• On September 1 the treasurer issues the tax certificate to the county itself. Under s. 74.57 the county treasurer issues a tax certificate for the taxes and charges unpaid at the close of August 31, and the certificate holder is the county. The investor product that lien states sell simply does not exist in Wisconsin.
• The owner redeems from the county, generally within two years. Redemption means paying the delinquent taxes with the accrued interest and penalty to the county treasurer. While the certificate runs, the county holds a lien and nothing more; it cannot sell the land.
• Title moves by tax deed or by in rem foreclosure. When redemption expires unredeemed, the county may take a tax deed under ss. 75.01, 75.12 and 75.14, after the notice s. 75.12 requires, with the owner able to redeem until the deed is recorded; or it may foreclose in rem under s. 75.521, where the published notice fixes a last day for redemption at least eight weeks after first publication and the judgment vests title in the county. The City of Milwaukee and Milwaukee County may file after one year of delinquency; other counties generally after two years.
• Only then does the public get a purchase point. Tax-deeded lands are sold under ss. 75.35, 75.36 and 75.69 in the manner the county board sets: sealed bids, standing lists, online auctions and over-the-counter sales all appear in this set. Where s. 75.69 governs, no parcel may be sold for less than its appraised value, and conveyances are executed by the county clerk.
• The former owner keeps two statutory protections. The county board must provide by ordinance a right for the former owner of a single-family owner-occupied property to repurchase before the county sells (s. 75.35(3)), and on any sale the proceeds are distributed under s. 75.36, with the remainder going to a former owner who used the property as a homestead in the five years before acquisition (s. 75.36(4)).

How buying works in Brown County

Registration runs through the Wisconsin Surplus auction platform for the specific auction batch: register on the platform, read the batch terms, and bid against the published minimum starting bid for the parcel. There is no separate county bidder registration in the records read.

• The appraisal is the market's first opinion, and the floor. Under s. 75.69 a county cannot sell below appraised value, so the interesting Wisconsin parcels are the ones where the appraisal is stale, the property has changed, or two sale rounds have taught the county its floor is wrong. Research the parcel against the appraisal, not against the tax amount, which the buyer never sees as a price.
• Time is the real inventory cost. A parcel entering delinquency today reaches a county sale years later: certificate period, deed or foreclosure, appraisal, then the sale round. The buyers who do well in Wisconsin work the standing lists and repeat sales patiently instead of waiting for a single annual event that does not exist.

Terms: what a bid actually costs

Unsold parcels: back out at a lower minimum

A Brown County parcel that draws no acceptable bid does not leave the system. The board records show leftovers handled expressly: parcels are put back out for bid with reduced minimum starting bids, sometimes as low as 100 or 500 dollars on small vacant lots, or offered to adjoining landowners where that corrects a title problem. The repeat auction at a cut minimum is the Brown County leftover channel, and the history of a parcel's minimums is public in the board minutes.

Before you bid

• Forget the lien auction playbook. There is no certificate to buy, no rate to bid down and no redemption premium to collect in Wisconsin. Every number that matters sits on the land side: appraised value, condition, title after the county's acquisition, and the county's sale terms.
• Check the former owner's position before you price. The repurchase right and the proceeds rules mean some parcels come to sale with a former owner who can still act, and homestead proceeds follow the former owner after your purchase, not you. Read the county ordinance provisions for the parcel's sale round.
• Assume the sale calendar is a watch, not a date. Most Wisconsin counties in this set sell when inventory and appraisals are ready: standing lists, sealed bid rounds and platform auctions through the year. The pages that name no date are telling the truth about the system.
• Set the maximum before you bid. The free Max-Bid Calculator below works backwards from your exit value to the highest bid you can pay, with the costs shown.

Every Wisconsin county in this set

One page per county, each verified against its own county source. Wisconsin has 72 counties; this set is the top 10 by population.

• Milwaukee County tax sales
• Dane County tax sales
• Waukesha County tax sales
• Brown County (this page)
• Racine County tax sales
• Kenosha County tax sales
• Outagamie County tax sales
• Winnebago County tax sales
• La Crosse County tax sales
• Marathon County tax sales

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. The same desk runs Florida tax deed sales, Texas tax sales, Pennsylvania tax sales, Georgia tax sales, North Carolina tax foreclosure sales, Ohio tax foreclosure sales, Illinois tax lien sales, Michigan tax foreclosure sales, Arizona tax lien sales, California tax defaulted property sales, Colorado tax lien sales, South Carolina tax sales, Indiana tax lien sales, Tennessee delinquent tax sales, Wisconsin tax deed sales and Missouri tax sales, and the proven New York season, with the live membership, sits in the NY tax sale hub.