815.31.Notice of sale of realty; manner; adjournment.

Section 815.31(1) requires the time and place of a real estate execution sale to be publicly advertised by posting a written notice, describing the property with reasonable certainty, at least three weeks before the sale, in one public place in the town or municipality where the sale will be held, with website posting layered on where the county maintains one. If the property is situated in a different town or municipality than where the sale will happen, notice is posted there too, again with website posting where available.

Subsection (2) requires the notice to run in a newspaper of the county, printed each week for three successive weeks before the sale. If the county has no newspaper and the premises are not occupied by anyone connected with the execution — the person against whom it issued, or a tenant or purchaser under that person — the notice instead runs in a paper printed at Madison. The court or a judge, on application of the party who issued the execution, directs by order which newspaper carries the publication.

Subsection (5) gives the sheriff room to adjourn the sale, from time to time, up to three months in total, when doing so serves the interest of everyone concerned. Public notice of the adjournment is given at the time and place originally set, and if the adjournment runs more than a day, further notice is given by posting, publishing, or both, as time and circumstances allow. Every sale, whenever it finally happens, is held at auction between 9 o’clock in the forenoon and 5 o’clock in the afternoon.