The Truth about Virtual Sheriff Sales

True/Fact: The Sheriff’s Office does not foreclose on properties. The foreclosure
process is a COURT process that can take years. The Sheriff’s Office has no
involvement in the foreclosure process.

False/Fiction: The Sheriff’s Office decides what properties go to foreclosure sale. The Sheriff
promotes gentrification of our neighborhoods through the Sheriff Sale.

True/Fact: The Sheriff’s Office is the enforcement arm of the courts and only sells
properties as a result of a COURT order.

False/Fiction: The Sheriff’s Office decides what properties go to foreclosure sale. The Sheriff
promotes gentrification of our neighborhoods through the Sheriff Sale.

True/Fact: The Sheriff’s Office process is controlled by and mandated by the

Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure for handling the properties pre-sale, in-sale and
post-sale.

False/Fiction: Virtual sales will adversely impact Philadelphia Citizens and that they will lose
their rights by moving to virtual sales. Virtual sales have taken the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil
Procedure out of the Sheriff Sale process. Homeowners will lose the protection they had with
live Sheriff Sales.

True/Fact: Sheriff Bilal has fashioned the virtual sale to mirror the live Sheriff Sale.

False/Fiction: If the Sheriff Sale process changes too much and too quickly, this could
accelerate and exacerbate negative trends such as homeowner displacement and
neighborhood instability. Virtual Sales will increase and promote gentrification.

True/Fact: Sheriff Bilal has posted the conditions of sale along with recorded town halls
and press conference videos on its website to educate buyers. Many of the conditions
of sale remain the same as they were for live Sheriff Sales. To date over 5,000 people
have viewed our informational videos.

False/Fiction: Potential Buyers are not aware of the rights of the homeowners. Buyers will not
be made aware of the post sale procedures and rights of prior owners and occupants such as,
the right of redemption for tax foreclosures.
True/Fact: Homeowners and Occupants CANNOT be removed from any property,
without the buyer going through the process of ejectment. The buyer is made aware of
this process in our conditions of sale.

False/Fiction: Once a property is sold at Sheriff Sale the prior homeowner or occupant is
evicted. The Sheriff’s Office will evict occupants from their homes without due process.

True/Fact: The Sheriff Sale is a public auction open to all and as such CANNOT
discriminate against anyone!

False/Fiction: Virtual sales will adversely impact Philadelphians. A flood of out of city and out of
state speculators will buy up the properties rather than Philadelphians.

True/Fact: Court Order #68, issued on December 23, 2020, announced and publicly
noticed that the Sheriff Sale would proceed virtually in April 2021.

False/Fiction: There was no clear communication or transparency with regard to the Sheriff
sale moving to a virtual platform. Philadelphians were not notified in a timely fashion that the
Sheriff Sales would be virtual sales.

True/Fact: Sheriff Bilal selected Bid4Assets to conduct the virtual sales because of their
ability to fashion the virtual sale to mirror the live Sheriff Sale.

False/Fiction: There are complications and issues that have arisen from using a virtual
platform. Philadelphians have lost their rights by sales being virtual.

True/Fact: Bid4Assets has been in existence for more than 20 years. They have
successfully conducted virtual sales for federal agencies and virtual Sheriff Sales in
other Pennsylvania counties.

False/Fiction: Bid4Assets was not properly vetted before being chosen for Philadelphia Virtual
Sheriff Sales. There are unnamed unintended consequences that will arise from virtual Sheriff
Sales.
 FYI – Bid4Assets

• Bid4Assets was founded in 1999. Over the past twenty years, the company has worked
with hundreds of agencies and conducted thousands of online public auctions, resulting
in 125,000 properties for over $1 billion in gross sales.

• Bid4Assets conducted the first online auctions of tax-defaulted or foreclosed properties

and tax liens for numerous counties nationwide. Bid4Assets has sold assets in all 50
states and internationally including homes, land, multi-family, commercial, agricultural,
mobile homes, timeshares, and more.

• Bid4Assets holds online sheriff sales on a regular basis for Montgomery County. In the
first auction in October, a total of 781 bids were placed, 16 properties were sold for
approximately $2.5 million. The sale began with 250 properties, but a flood of
postponements reduced the number of properties available for bidding to 37.

• Bid4Assets hosted Monroe County’s first sheriff sale on January 28, 2021. The sales
generated $3.4 million in third party sales.