Missouri · Law checked October 19, 2026

Missouri tax sale: your deadline, your office, your money

Behind on property taxes in Missouri? Your house can be sold at a tax sale — here's how much time you have to stop it. Your house was sold at a tax sale in Missouri? The extra money from the sale may be yours to claim — and there's a deadline. Both answers are on this page, from the statute.

Count my Missouri deadline

How Missouri sells

The machine, in four lines

Door one: getting the house back (redemption)

Your window: 1 year after the certificate sale as an absolute right — and a defeasible right that continues until the purchaser actually acquires the collector's deed. Treat the year as your deadline, counted from the certificate sale date. Statute-verified

What it costs to redeem: The purchase money + costs, with interest on the certificate of up to 10% per year (no interest is charged on any amount bid over the taxes and costs) + later taxes at 8% per year.

Source: RSMo §140.340

Before any sale: your quieter doors

Payment plans: Yes in places: a county may by ordinance allow installment payment of current and delinquent taxes (§139.052); in Chapter 141 court proceedings the collector may sign a written installment redemption contract — up to 24 months, and up to 48 months for a homestead on good cause (§141.530).

Deferrals (senior / veteran / disability): No deferral found. (The senior homestead tax freeze/credit is a freeze on increases, not a deferral of taxes owed.)

Door two: the extra money (surplus)

Who holds the money: the County Treasurer (held in the county treasury in trust).

Your claim window: The surplus is held in trust for 3 years. Lienholders of record are paid first, by priority; the recorded owner takes what remains. Nothing is distributed until 90 days after the redemption period expires. Statute-verified

If nobody claims it: Surplus still unclaimed at the end of the 3 years becomes part of the permanent county school fund.

Source: RSMo §140.230

The county figure rule. This page gives you the law — the window, the formula, the office. The exact payoff or surplus figure lives in the County Collector (Collector of Revenue in charter counties and St. Louis)'s books and changes as interest runs. Ask that office for the figure, in writing, and keep the letter.

Included in the $49 TaxSaleDecoded Kit

  • The surplus claim pack: how to prove the house was yours (deed records, address history, ID), the claim-form path in your state, and what to do when the county says it has no record of your money
  • The redemption playbook: your state's window and cost formula worked step by step, who to pay, how to prove you paid, and the traps in the payoff figure (added fees and interest)
  • The heirs page: the house was a parent's — what changes, which papers prove you are an heir, and the point where it stops being simple
  • The scam shield: how surplus-recovery companies work, the fee caps your state sets for them, and the assignment papers you should never sign
  • The lookback module: what Tyler won, what Pung limited (the extra money is the sale price minus the debt — not your home's value), and the dated state lookbacks, including Illinois claims that die in July 2028

Get the TaxSaleDecoded Kit — $49

One payment of $49. No subscription. The kit is a web page you can return to and print — the claim pack, the redemption playbook, the heirs page, and the scam shield.

All 50 states · The surplus, explained · Redemption, explained