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9510-9517 Notice of Public Auction: Publishing Criteria

9510. TIME OF PUBLICATION
Publication shall begin not less than 21 days prior to the date of the sale (Rev. & Tax. Code §3702). The publishing schedule shall be once a week for three successive weeks with at least five days intervening between respective publication dates. The period of notice commences on the first day of publication and terminates on the twenty-first day (Gov. Code §6063).

9511. MANNER AND PERIOD OF PUBLICATION
Pursuant to Revenue and Taxation Code section 3702, the tax collector must publish a notice of intended sale once a week for three successive weeks in both:

1) A newspaper of general circulation published in the county seat, and

2) A newspaper of general circulation published within the judicial district in which the property is situated.

COMMENT:  Under (1) above, the complete list of properties being offered for sale throughout the county appears in the newspaper published in the county seat. Under (2) above, a list of only those properties lying within, or within the proximity of, the judicial district need be published in the newspaper lying within that district or area (Attorney General Letter 12-22-65).

If the same newspaper of general circulation is published in both the county seat and the judicial district, or if the publication of the notice of sale is made in a newspaper that is determined pursuant to Revenue and Taxation Code section 3381 as most likely to afford adequate notice of the sale, publication in that paper satisfies the requirements for publication.

9512. PUBLICATION IN MORE THAN ONE EDITION
The notice must appear in each edition if more than one edition is printed on the days of publication (Attorney General Opinion 1-12-55).

9513. MINIMUM PRICE REQUIREMENT
Except for mineral rights or unusable parcels, the minimum price at which property may be offered for sale the first time must be an amount not less than the total amount necessary to redeem, plus costs (Rev. & Tax. Code §3698.5). Property that has been granted a welfare exemption and is subject to sale must have a minimum bid amount of 50 percent of its fair market value (Rev. & Tax. Code §3698.7).

9514. ADDITIONAL NOTICE OF SALE
In addition to the published notice required by Revenue and Taxation Code section 3702, the tax collector may advertise the intended sale by any means authorized by the board of supervisors (Rev. & Tax. Code §3704.5).

9515. COST OF ADVERTISING
The cost of advertising is taken out of the proceeds of the sale (Rev. & Tax. Code §§3719, 4673). See M-8500 et seq. for distribution of the proceeds after the sale.

9516. ERRORS IN PUBLICATION
If there is a fatal error in the first publication, a correction in the remaining publications will not validate the notice, because the law requires three correct publications (Rev. & Tax. Code §3702; Gov. Code §6063). An error may be corrected if time permits republication of the notice prior to the statutory deadline. This means that the publication process must begin not less than 21 days prior to the sale (M-9510). When the statutory deadline cannot be met, any properties that are affected by the error must be withdrawn from the sale. In an effort to eliminate errors in publication, proofsheets from the newspapers should be obtained prior to publication.

9517. POSTING OF NOTICE IF NO PUBLICATION
If a newspaper of general circulation, as defined in Government Code section 6000 et seq., does not exist within the county, the notification process is accomplished by posting the notice in three public places within the county seat or in the judicial district in which the property is located (Rev. & Tax. Code §3702). The requirements for the content of the posted notice are the same as for the content of the published notice.

The notice may be posted in three public places in the county seat and in the judicial district instead of being published in newspapers if the board of supervisors determines that the amount likely to be received for the property to be sold at auction will be less than the cost of publishing in the newspapers (Rev. & Tax. Code §3703). See form SCO 9-02 for the content of the affidavit for posting.