Kentucky tax sale properties, straight from county records. Last refreshed Oct 19, 2026. Auction dates and opening bids can change at the county. Check the county link on a listing before you bid.
Kentucky county clerks sell certificates of delinquency once a year. There is no bidding: registered buyers take turns choosing certificates in an order set by a random drawing, and pay the amount due. A certificate earns 12% simple interest a year. If the owner does not pay, you can sue to foreclose once a year has passed since the taxes became delinquent; the court then sells the property at a public auction.
Redemption Period
Until the court sale
Certificate of delinquency sold by the county clerk at the amount due, with no bidding. The owner can pay it off at any time until a court foreclosure sale, and you earn 12% simple interest a year on what you paid. You can sue to foreclose once one year has passed since the taxes became delinquent.
No fixed redemption period. The owner can pay the certificate off at any time until a court foreclosure sale. The holder may file that suit once one year has passed since the taxes became delinquent (KRS 134.546), which is January 1 of the year after the bill.
Avg Property Tax Rate
0.86%
Near the national average (1.1%).
Homestead Rules
Special Rules Apply
Homestead exemption for 65+.
Words used on this page
Redemption period
A window after the sale when the old owner can pay up and take the property back.
Homestead exemption
A tax break on an owner's main home. It changes what the minimum bid includes.
Tax lien
The county sells the unpaid tax debt, not the property. You collect interest, or later foreclose.
Before you bid in Kentucky
What can survive the sale and become yours
IRS federal tax liens (cleared only if the United States is named in the foreclosure suit)
Certificates for other tax years held by other buyers
Severed coal, oil and gas rights (taxed and sold separately)
Other things to check
Kentucky is a tax lien state.
Each county clerk sells certificates of delinquency once a year on a statewide schedule, mostly July to October.
There is no bidding: registered buyers take turns picking certificates in an order set by a random drawing, and pay the amount due.
Certificates left over can then be bought from the clerk on any business day.
Buying more than three in a county, more than five statewide, or more than $10,000 a year requires registering with the Department of Revenue first.
A certificate earns 12% simple interest a year on what you paid; pre-lawsuit attorney fees are capped by law at $350 to $700 depending on the certificate amount, plus up to $115 in assignment fees.
You must mail the owner and any mortgage holder a notice within 50 days of buying and every six months after.
The owner can pay at any time before a foreclosure sale.
Once one year has passed since the taxes became delinquent (and within eleven years), you may sue in circuit court after 45 days' certified-mail notice; the court sells the property at a public auction, you are paid from the proceeds, and you may bid.
If the sale brings less than two-thirds of the appraised value, the owner has six months to buy it back.
Severed coal, oil and gas rights are taxed and sold separately from the surface.
How we rate these
Every listing says one of four things. Next to it is how many facts we hold
for it, and what that much evidence is good enough for.
Worth a look
We hold the four basics (what is being sold, when, for how much, and what the property is) and nothing we hold argues against it. A claim about our record, not a promise about the property.
Needs review
We hold the basics, but a named finding wants a human first: a possible lien under the owner's name, a flood or environmental record, no mapped public road, a property check that fired, an opening bid at or above the value we hold for the parcel, or a sale the county reports as postponed.
Screened out
We hold positive evidence of a problem: recorded debt or an IRS lien that survives the sale, a lot too small to be a real parcel, a sale the county reports as over, or a sale date already past. The card names it.
Not enough data yet
One of the four basics is missing. This is not a bad rating: missing data can never produce a negative verdict.
N of 12 facts on file
How many of the 12 facts we track for this parcel we actually hold: sale kind, auction date, entry price, property class, value, lot size, living area, legal description, road access, title search, condition, sale terms. The same count on the board, the deal page and in Flexy. Hover the bar on any card to see which are still missing.
One number cannot say both how good a parcel looks and how much we actually know
about it, and a low number reads as a verdict. So we do not print one.
“Not enough data yet” is not a judgement about the property.
Kentucky is a tax lien state. Certificate of delinquency sold by the county clerk at the amount due, with no bidding. The owner can pay it off at any time until a court foreclosure sale, and you earn 12% simple interest a year on what you paid. You can sue to foreclose once one year has passed since the taxes became delinquent.
Kentucky has no fixed redemption period. The owner can pay off the certificate at any time until the property is sold in a court foreclosure. The certificate holder may file that foreclosure once one year has passed since the taxes became delinquent, after 45 days' certified-mail notice, and must file within eleven years.
DeedFlex aggregates Kentucky tax sale listings from county auction platforms and gives each property a plain-English verdict: Worth a look, Needs review, Screened out, or Not enough data yet. Next to it is how far the research has got on it. Start with Pro ($59/mo, billed monthly) to browse all available Kentucky properties with full deal analysis.
Key risks include: IRS federal tax liens (cleared only if the United States is named in the foreclosure suit), Certificates for other tax years held by other buyers, Severed coal, oil and gas rights (taxed and sold separately). Kentucky is a tax lien state. Each county clerk sells certificates of delinquency once a year on a statewide schedule, mostly July to October. There is no bidding: registered buyers take turns picking certificates in an order set by a random drawing, and pay the amount due. Certificates left over can then be bought from the clerk on any business day. Buying more than three in a county, more than five statewide, or more than $10,000 a year requires registering with the Department of Revenue first. A certificate earns 12% simple interest a year on what you paid; pre-lawsuit attorney fees are capped by law at $350 to $700 depending on the certificate amount, plus up to $115 in assignment fees. You must mail the owner and any mortgage holder a notice within 50 days of buying and every six months after. The owner can pay at any time before a foreclosure sale. Once one year has passed since the taxes became delinquent (and within eleven years), you may sue in circuit court after 45 days' certified-mail notice; the court sells the property at a public auction, you are paid from the proceeds, and you may bid. If the sale brings less than two-thirds of the appraised value, the owner has six months to buy it back. Severed coal, oil and gas rights are taxed and sold separately from the surface.
Opening bids vary widely by county and property. Kentucky has an average property tax rate of 0.86%, which influences opening bid amounts. DeedFlex shows the opening bid for every listed property. Where we hold a market value we can stand behind, we show it; where we do not, we say so rather than print a number we cannot support.
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