Why Don't We Blog This?

Posted by Jerry:

As we digest the data, stories, and ideas from the auction, here’s the raw financial big picture, excerpted from a Q&A thread on WDWOT called “How would you redesign the auction?”

image of Detroit made out of numbers by Alex B Hill:

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…Also think about the financial collection gap in the current approach, where the unprecedented scale of Detroit’s tax foreclosures really throws off the curve. This year’s auction generated approximately $50,000,000 in bids, which appears to leave an approximately *Quarter Billion Dollar* deficit in tax revenue the county says it’s owed.

Since 2,000 tax foreclosed properties were withdrawn from the auction after starting with 22,500 — presumably because the owners got on some sort of tax plan — the totals originally owed may have changed somewhat, but there will also be some bids where the money doesn’t actually come in:

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• Sum of all back taxes originally owed on all 2012’s tax foreclosures in all Wayne County: $275,521,615 
• All back taxes owed just Detroit: $239,845,800 
• All back taxes owed everywhere else: $35,675,815

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• Total money bid at auction in all Wayne County (Round 1 & 2): $49,975,566 
• Total money bid in just Detroit: $32,525,044 
• Total money bid elsewhere: $17,450,522

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***Countywide collection gap: $225,546,049***

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You can see some county stats including the number of properties sold (11,972) and unsold (8,686) athttp://whydontweownthis.com/us/mi/wayne

And Detroit stats (10,570 sold and 7,907 unsold) athttp://whydontweownthis.com/us/mi/wayne/detroit

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We should add the total back taxes owed to the dashboard, too, for easier comparison — had to add up totals from individual cities.

I remember when Macomb County decided to sell all its 627 tax foreclosure auction properties to one bidder without competition for $4.8 million a little bit back, the reason given was that the county just needed to cover back taxes owed, and since the buyer was willing to pay, their duty was done without needing an auction. (Map and link to news story athttp://whydontweownthis.com/us/mi/macomb ). If raw financials are the driving duty, and if the gap is really is in the neighborhood of $225,546,049, we gotta get Wayne County on kickstarter.com. Jeepers.