Letter outrages county residents with delinquent taxes
TOM MORTON Star-Tribune staff writer | Posted: Friday, October 24, 2008 12:00 am
A letter has puzzled, if not angred and outraged, scores of Natrona County residents delinquent in paying their property taxes, with the properties being sold at county tax sales.
"I was scared; I thought I had no place to live," Carolyn Moore said. "I thought they were going to kick me out of my house."
The Oct. 5 letter identified Moore's real estate by its parcel number. Its author, Sarah Nicely, wrote that public records indicated the property was delinquent for nonpayment of taxes, and was sold at the county tax sale.
"In the event you have not redeemed this property, and only if you do not intend to redeem it, please return this letter to me with the information requested below, AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE.
"OR BETTER YET! Email me … I will contact you, as soon as possible, with an idea which may prove interesting and advantageous to you."
Moore thought the letter was legitimate, and it frightened her.
Moore wasn't alone, because scores of people phoned and visited the treasurer's office wondering what happened and if they were about to lose their homes.
Natrona County Treasurer Tom Doyle told them they weren't.
"What I'm telling people is to throw them away," Doyle said. "They mean absolutely nothing."
Nicely's letter was legal, as was her offer to purchase delinquent taxpayers' properties, he said.
She legally obtained the names, addresses and parcel numbers from public records available after May 10 of each tax year, Doyle said.
The "county tax sale" refers to a provision in state law that allows people to buy the taxes and interest on the real estate that is delinquent on its taxes, he said. "So [the buyers] have a lien."
The property itself is not sold, Doyle said.
If, after four years, the owner hasn't paid the taxes and redeemed the property, it can go into foreclosure, he said.
The buyers of the property taxes earn 15 percent on anything they invest, plus 3 percent on their original investment, Doyle said.
While the calls to Doyle's office have dwindled, he said people were still upset, especially those who had paid their delinquent taxes before receiving Nicely's letter.
Nicely, who does not have a listed phone number, responded to questions by e-mail.
She pulled the business opportunity idea from an Internet course that provides drafts of the letter, she wrote. "This is actually very common in the tax sale industry."
The idea is simple, Nicely wrote.
"We were only contacting delinquent tax owners that had no intention of redeeming, and would offer to purchase their property for a token payment," she wrote. "This gives them the opportunity to take a tax deduction."
Many letter recipients didn't feel like it was an opportunity as much as it was a threat, which surprised Nicely, she said. "Was it something that we were expecting or wanting to deal with, NO."
Some respondents wanted to consider her offer, some wanted to know why their taxes were delinquent, and some were upset, Nicely wrote.
Doyle also exchanged e-mails with her and told her to target people who were in their fourth year of tax delinquency, if she thinks about doing this again, she wrote.
Nicely contacted the company on the Internet and asked why she would get such a negative response. The company told her not to worry about it, adding such a program will make counties upset because it affects their money, she wrote.
She believes her motives were pure.
"I have not and will not ever threaten or scare someone into selling their property to me," Nicely wrote. "My intentions were to help the people who could not pay for their property taxes and that did not want their properties."
Reach Tom Morton at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@trib.com.