§ 34.0445.Persons Eligible to Purchase Real Property

A bidder eligibility provision aimed at a specific abuse, and it operates on the deed rather than on the bid.

An officer may not execute or deliver a deed unless the purchaser exhibits either an unexpired written statement under the Tax Code showing the county assessor-collector has determined there are no delinquent ad valorem taxes owed by the person to that county and no known or reported delinquent taxes owed to any school district or municipality in the county — or a written registration statement showing the person is a registered bidder at the sale.

The rule addresses a familiar pattern. A person owing delinquent taxes on property already held should not be acquiring more at a public sale run by the same county.

Enforcement at the deed stage rather than the bidding stage is deliberate. An officer conducting an auction cannot verify tax status mid-sale; refusing the deed afterwards is workable and just as effective.

Subsection (b) closes the obvious evasion: an individual may not bid on or purchase the property in the name of any other individual, and the officer may not execute or deliver a deed to any person other than the successful bidder.

Without that, a disqualified buyer would send someone else.

The deed must recite that the bidder exhibited the required statement, and where it contains that recital, it is conclusively presumed that this section was complied with.

The conclusive presumption is what protects the title. A later purchaser reading the deed need not investigate the original bidder’s tax status, and a defect cannot be raised years afterwards to unsettle the chain.

A knowing violation is a Class B misdemeanor, and the section controls over any conflicting law.

It applies only in counties of 250,000 or more, or in a smaller county whose commissioners court has adopted it by order.