mom 86, has diabeties, has pace maker, has home health care come on Tuesday and Thursday, sometime is aware of her surrounding, but some not, gave my brother pow of att just before heart surgery, I have two sisters that live in same town, all property that was in mom name is now in brothers, no taxes have been paid on any property. does not provide food, utilities are cut off 2 or 3 times a year, when he is confronted the answer is , "I have power of attorn and you don't need to worry. I live across country, I have research and gotten information, he has been sueded by two nursing homes or non-payment, tool out 48,800 mortgage, $ was not invested in my mom house, house is to be auctioned for back taxes, 2009 - 2012 (1600.00), my plans are to go to her state, retain attorney, and do what I can, advise
Find out what mom's state has as the redemption period for tax sale property.
This will be essential to know if you want to try to keep the property. Most county tax assessors have all parcel information on line. So go to the county tax assessor site to see if they do. Information on the property will be by it's parcel number. The parcel # is usually the key to everything on the property. It will be in the tax sale info that was published in the newspaper. Once you have the parcel number, you can then get any documents done & filed on the property. Most counties have the past 10 years available at very low cost (a few $'s) and as a download. For legal older, they research and mail to you but still at minimal cost.
You need to find out if the back taxes are at the point of being fully redeemable.
In my area it is 3 full years and the first year tax sale holder can redeem it. But most people that do tax sales, DO NOT WANT THE PROPERTY, they want the 18% - 25% interest that it pays. So you just pay off the taxes & interest and it still remains mom's property. If you can't pay off all the taxes & fees, pay off the # of years you need to keep the property from being redeemable. Most tax assessors will not take a personal check, so it;s a cashier;s check. Keep copies of everything you pay for and have the receipt clearly read that you (your name) paid for the taxes.
If the holder of the tax sale certificate has actually filed to become the owner, they would have had to a transfer of ownership filed at the courthouse (& pay off all the other years taxes & fees outstanding) and then to do a "quiet title" action. For a quiet title, there would have been a notice in the paper on this as there is a legal hearing for quieting a title. If that did happen, it will be another issue to prove in your favor to show that brother is not capable to be POA.
But really most tax sale buyers do NOT want the property, they want the interest on their investment - which is the taxes and fees they paid at the tax sale.