The surplus on a foreclosure surplus funds or tax sale surplus funds lead is always an estimate. The county, the court or the trustee decides what is actually paid out, after liens, fees and any competing claims. What we can do is build the estimate carefully and show you how we got there.
How the estimate is built
We start from the auction result: the opening bid, the winning bid and who bought the property. Then we work out what was owed: the judgment where there is one, the estimated mortgage balance and the principal worked forward from the original loan. The estimate is the sale price minus that debt, so it is a subtraction you can follow rather than a number you have to trust.
Why we aim for $20,000 or more
A claim takes the same work whatever it is worth: finding the former owner, several calls, an agreement, paperwork, a filing and a wait. Below an estimated $20,000 the fee rarely covers that time once you count the cases that never sign, so that is the range we focus our research on.
Why third-party sales
When the lender takes a property back at auction, there is usually nothing left over. We look at who bought the property before we research the debt, so our time goes to the sales most likely to have produced surplus funds.
What it means for you
Treat every figure as a starting point for your own verification, not a promise of what the owner will receive. Each lead carries the case number and parcel ID so you can pull the record yourself and check our work. The full list of fields is on the how it works page.