State Codes and Statutes
Statutes > West-virginia > 11a > 11a-3-19§11A-3-19. What purchaser must do before he can secure deed.
(a) At any time after the thirty-first day of October of the year following the sheriff's sale, and on or before the thirty-first day of December of the same year, the purchaser, his or her heirs or assigns, in order to secure a deed for the real estate subject to the tax lien or liens purchased, shall: (1) Prepare a list of those to be served with notice to redeem and request the clerk to prepare and serve the notice as provided in sections twenty-one and twenty-two of this article; (2) provide the clerk with a list of any additional expenses incurred after the first day of January of the year following the sheriff's sale for the preparation of the list of those to be served with notice to redeem including proof of the additional expenses in the form of receipts or other evidence of reasonable legal expenses incurred for the services of any attorney who has performed an examination of the title to the real estate and rendered a written opinion and certification thereon; (3) deposit, or offer to deposit, with the clerk a sum sufficient to cover the costs of preparing and serving the notice; and (4) present the purchaser's certificate of sale, or order of the county commission where the certificate has been lost or wrongfully withheld from the owner, to the clerk of the county commission. For failure to meet these requirements, the purchaser shall lose all the benefits of his or her purchase.
(b) If the person requesting preparation and service of the notice is an assignee of the purchaser, he or she shall, at the time of the request, file with the clerk a written assignment to him or her of the purchaser's rights, executed, acknowledged and certified in the manner required to make a valid deed.
(c) Whenever any certificate given by the sheriff for a tax lien on any land, or interest in the land sold for delinquent taxes, or any assignment of the lien is lost or wrongfully withheld from the rightful owner of the land and the land or interest has not been redeemed, the county commission may receive evidence of the loss or wrongful detention and, upon satisfactory proof of that fact, may cause a certificate of the proof and finding, properly attested by the county clerk under the seal of the county, to be delivered to the rightful claimant, and a record of the certificate shall be duly made by the county clerk in the recorded proceedings of the commission.
