US Tax Lien & Deed Investing Dataset 2026

Every US state and DC, scored 0-10 across nine investing dimensions, each score backed by the statute and a primary source we actually read. Explore by map or table, or download the raw data. Free to use with attribution.

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Colored by composite score, greener is stronger for a retail investor.

West

Mountain

Midwest

South

Northeast

strong (6+) mixed (3-6) weak / no retail market

Click a state to see its tax-sale profile.

Scores are relative rankings for a retail investor, not investment advice. Click any state for the full sourced breakdown.

Need county-level data?

This covers all 50 states + DC. Inside the dashboard we go deeper, county-level auction platforms, schedules, and redemption detail, plus tools to track your own certificates. Free to start.

Methodology

Every state plus the District of Columbia was researched against primary sources, state statutes, county treasurer and tax-collector pages, and official auction platforms, then scored 0-10 on the nine dimensions below. Every state page carries the sources used. Corrections we made against commonly-cited-but-wrong data include Florida (a lien-certificate state, routinely mislabeled a deed state), West Virginia, Connecticut, and Arizona.

Effective Yield

Realistic annualized return after competition bids the rate down, not the statutory ceiling.

Penalty Structure

Whether a flat penalty is owed in full even on a day-one redemption (best) versus slow simple interest (weakest).

Redemption Speed

How fast capital recycles: shorter redemption windows score higher.

Auction Access

Statewide online portals score highest; in-person-only or institutional-bulk-only score lowest.

Low Competition

Rewards states where retail investors aren't crowded out by institutional funds.

Low Capital Entry

Small-dollar liens score high; full-price property purchases score low.

Process Safety

Self-executing lien-to-deed paths score high; judicial foreclosure and strict-notice traps score low.

Legal Stability

Decades-stable statutes score high; recent rewrites (e.g. post-Tyler v. Hennepin) score low.

OTC Availability

Robust over-the-counter / assignment inventory scores high.

Cite this dataset

DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21185506

TaxLienSimple (2026). US State Tax Lien & Deed Investing Dataset. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21185506 · canonical: taxliensimple.com/dataset. CC-BY 4.0, free to use with attribution.

Also available on Zenodo · Hugging Face · Kaggle · GitHub