Greene Co tax sale raises questions about property ownership

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) – Next week hundreds of properties will be up for tax sale in Greene County.

Notices went out weeks ago. Most went to not only property owners with a financial interest.

But some were mailed to those who sold their homes years ago, like Andy Keith.

“At first I was just about threw it in the trash,” he said.

He says he was surprised to receive a bill from the Greene County Collector. In fact he thought it was a scam.

“I got to looking into it a little bit more. It is official,” he said.

Keith did a some research and learned that the tax sale notice was for property he once owned.

“I looked into it. It turned out that we somehow own ten feet of the back of the lot of the house we sold in 2006,” he explained.

He says he tried unsuccessfully to figure out why he received the bill but more importantly why only ten feet of the property was for sale.

“I’ve contacted the county assessor’s office and they kind of gave me the typical government runaround. I contacted the tax collector.

That office showed some concern about it and said they’d look into it but I have not heard anything back from them at all,” explained Keith.

Keith currently lives in North Carolina. He reached out for our help in contacting local officials.

Greene County Collector Allan Icet said, “There’s a lot of groundwork that needs to take place to collect information, do title searches and then contact either the property owner or anyone who has a financial interest in the property to alert them to the fact that that piece of property is going up for tax sale.”

It’s why he says Keith got the tax sale notice.

“The person owes nothing. It’s more for his information,” said Icet.

Keith is off the hook but others may not be.

“We want to keep taxpayers informed about what they need to do if they do owe taxes. The last thing we want to do it to sell someone’s property. We want them to be able to pay their property taxes and live on their property,” said Icet.

“It’s not going to affect us as far as I can tell. But it’s definitely going to affect a lot of people in Springfield and Greene County,” said Keith.

The Greene County tax sale is scheduled to be held next Monday.

We are still working to obtain information about how lots was parceled out and why only small portions are up for sale.

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