When the sale is held
No statewide month. Each municipality sets its own date. A standard sale enforces arrears outstanding at the close of the fiscal year and is held in the following fiscal year; the collector must prepare the list at least 50 days before it. A municipality may also hold an accelerated sale in the last month of the fiscal year. Notice is posted in five public places in the municipality and published in a local newspaper once in each of the four calendar weeks before the sale week. A municipality may run the sale electronically through a nationally recognized electronic municipal tax lien service.
When taxes go delinquent
In a municipality on a calendar fiscal year, property taxes are payable in four installments, on February 1, May 1, August 1 and November 1, and each installment is delinquent if unpaid after its date. The governing body may charge delinquency interest of up to 8 percent a year on the first $1,500 and 18 percent a year on any amount above $1,500. Taxes are a continuous lien on the land, and later taxes, interest, penalties and costs are added to it. Every municipal lien is a first lien, paramount to prior or later encumbrances except later municipal liens. Unpaid taxes still in arrears at the close of the fiscal year must be enforced by a standard tax sale in the following fiscal year; a municipality may instead hold an accelerated sale in the last month of the same fiscal year for arrears outstanding on the 11th day of the eleventh month.
What happens after the sale
New Jersey holds no tax deed auction. A certificate holder who is not redeemed files an action in the Superior Court to foreclose the right of redemption: a private purchaser at any time after two years from the sale, the municipality (or anyone who takes the certificate from it by assignment or transfer) after six months, and any holder at any time if the property meets the statutory definition of abandoned property. Judgment bars redemption and vests title in the holder. Since P.L.2024, c.39 the owner or the owner's heirs may, before final judgment, demand that the foreclosure proceed by a sheriff's sale or a sheriff's Internet auction to preserve equity; that sale is run by the county sheriff and is a foreclosure sale of one parcel, not a tax sale, so a sheriff's sale listing is never the date of a municipality's certificate sale. Separately, a municipality holding its own certificates may foreclose by an in rem action once more than six months have passed since the sale and 21 months of taxes are unpaid.
Leftover parcels between sales
Parcels that draw no bid at the tax sale are struck off to the municipality at 18 percent. The municipality's governing body may later, by resolution, sell a certificate it holds by private sale through an assignment, for not less than the liens charged against the property (or not less than the assessed value where the liens exceed it), or offer held certificates at a separate public sale to the highest bidder, sometimes for less than the amount due. This is at the governing body's discretion, not a standing over-the-counter right, and a buyer at a 54:5-114.2 public sale must foreclose and record final judgment within two years of confirmation or lose the purchase. Assignments must be recorded with the county clerk and served on the tax collector.
These dates are the statewide statutory schedule. The exact auction date, registration deadline, and platform are set county by county, so confirm them on the New Jersey county pages before you plan a bid. For the mechanics of the sale itself, see how to buy in New Jersey.
Verified Sep 27, 2026 against New Jersey statutes.
Tax Sale Atlas publishes educational information about public tax sale processes. This is not legal, financial, or investment advice. Rules, dates, and fees change; confirm with the county office before you bid.