Lake County

8 signing locations

Zone 1 · Northeast

Regional Captain: Denise DiFabio

Want to volunteer in Lake County? Call or text your Regional Captain — they'll sign you up as a County Captain or circulator.

Businesses & venues

Matteo Aluminum

Wickliffe, OH 44092

1261 E 289 Street

Monday – Friday | 8:00 AM – 5:00 PM | Saturday | 8:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Petition signing in Office

Norman Monument Company

Painesville, OH 44077

2659 Narrows Road

Monday – Friday | 9am – 5pm

Otium Financial Planners

Willoughby Hills, OH 44094

34500 Chardon Rd., Suite 4

Monday – Thursday 9:00 AM – 4:30 PM | Fridays | 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Soto's Insurance

Painesville, OH 44077

180 Main St.

Monday - Friday 2:00 PM - 5:30 PM

Bilingual Spanish-English

Timothy Allen Jewelers

Mentor, OH 44060

8925 Mentor Avenue

Tuesday – Friday 11am – 5pm | Saturday 10am -4pm | Closed Sunday & Monday

Visual Graphics and Installations

Mentor, OH 44060

7969 Reynolds Road

Monday – Friday | 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM

VGSigns.com

Local volunteers

Private Residence

Mentor on the Lake, OH 44060

Private residence

Daily Noon – 4 pm

Call for appointment

Private Residence

Eastlake, OH 44095

Private residence

By appointment

Call for appointment. Near Eastlake Public Library.

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Lake County at a glance

Population: 232,000
Median home (2024) Median home (2024) The midpoint value of owner-occupied homes — half the county's homes are worth more, half less. Source: the Census Bureau's American Community Survey 5-year estimates (table B25077), which reflect what owners estimate their home is worth, not sale prices. The year shown is the most recent one published.: $214,100
Assessment ratio (2023) Assessment ratio (2023) How close the county auditor's appraised values are to what homes actually sell for. The Ohio Department of Taxation compares the auditor's appraised value to the real sale price on arm's-length sales and publishes a median ratio for each city and township; this figure combines those into one county number, weighted by each area's number of sales. 100% means appraisals matched sale prices. 75% means the typical home was appraised at about three-quarters of what it sold for; above 100% means the typical home was appraised for more than it sold for. It describes the county as a whole — any individual property can be far off it. (Ohio bills tax on 35% of appraised value; that 35% is fixed by statute and is not what this ratio measures.): 73.51%
Median income: $77,952
Parcels Parcels Separately taxed pieces of real property — each parcel has its own number on the auditor's books and its own tax bill. A tax foreclosure case usually covers a single parcel, so this is roughly the pool of properties those filings are drawn from. Figure as published on the committee's original county page.: 111,000
School districts: 9
Last Reappraisal Last Reappraisal Ohio counties reappraise every property every six years, with a lighter 'update' three years in between (ORC §5713.01). The values set in that year drive tax bills until the next one. Dates come from the Ohio Department of Taxation's published sexennial reappraisal and triennial update schedule.: 2024
Next Update Next Update Ohio counties reappraise every property every six years, with a lighter 'update' three years in between (ORC §5713.01). The values set in that year drive tax bills until the next one. Dates come from the Ohio Department of Taxation's published sexennial reappraisal and triennial update schedule.: 2027

Property Tax Lien Foreclosure History

Total filed Lost to sheriff sale Lost to sheriff sale — still gathering this data

4 4

2015: 4 filed

2015: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

15 2015

87 87

2016: 87 filed

2016: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

16 2016

65 65

2017: 65 filed

2017: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

17 2017

87 87

2018: 87 filed

2018: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

18 2018

42 42

2019: 42 filed

2019: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

19 2019

17 17

2020: 17 filed

2020: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

20 2020

25 25

2021: 25 filed

2021: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

21 2021

10 10

2022: 10 filed

2022: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

22 2022

14 14

2023: 14 filed

2023: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

23 2023

10 10

2024: 10 filed

2024: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

24 2024

19 19

2025: 19 filed

2025: lost-to-sale data still being gathered

25 2025

Why are 2019–2021 cases mostly still active? Ohio's COVID-19 emergency orders (beginning March 2020) imposed a foreclosure moratorium that paused most delinquent tax lien proceedings for over a year. Cases filed before and during the freeze accumulated in county courts and many are still working toward a final outcome — either a sheriff sale or a dismissal once the homeowner resolves the debt.

Why do some rows below show a dash (—)? Finding out whether a case was lost to sheriff sale, dismissed, or is still pending requires opening and reading each individual court case one at a time — it isn't reported anywhere as a simple summary number. We are actively working through this county-by-county for all Ohio counties. A dash means we don't have that breakdown yet, not that the outcome was zero.

Why does Assessment Ratio have gaps? The Ohio Department of Taxation only publishes this figure for years when Lake County underwent its sexennial reappraisal or triennial update — not every year in between. A dash means no study was conducted that year, not that the county was accurately assessed.

Metric	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
Treasurer Filed Foreclosures Treasurer Filed Foreclosures Tax lien foreclosure cases the county Treasurer filed against properties with unpaid property taxes — usually brought by the county Prosecutor on the Treasurer's behalf. Counted from the county's own court records, year by year; the source is linked below this table.	4	87	65	87	42	17	25	10	14	10	19
Tax Ease Ohio Filed Foreclosures Tax Ease Ohio Filed Foreclosures Foreclosure cases filed by Tax Ease Ohio — a private company that bought delinquent tax liens from the county and then went to court to collect on them. Ohio counties may sell tax liens this way under ORC §§5721.30–5721.43, and once sold it is the investor, not the county, that files the case.	0	0	0	100	44	49	21	21	3	13	0
NAR Ohio LLC Filed Foreclosures NAR Ohio LLC Filed Foreclosures Foreclosure cases filed by NAR Ohio LLC, a third-party investor that buys delinquent tax liens from counties and forecloses on them itself. Kept on its own row so each company's filings can be read separately.	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	24	50
Lost to Sale Lost to Sale Cases that ended with the property sold at sheriff's sale — the owner lost the home. This can only be determined by reading each case on the court docket, so a dash means we don't have that breakdown for the year yet, not that the number was zero.	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Dismissed Dismissed Cases closed without a sheriff's sale — typically because the owner paid off the delinquent taxes or worked out a payment plan. Also read case by case from the docket.	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Pending Pending Cases filed but not yet resolved by a sheriff's sale, dismissal, or other closure — still working their way through the court system. Where the court publishes a case status we use it directly; otherwise this is that year's filings minus the cases lost to sale and dismissed.	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
% Lost % Lost Lost to Sale divided by Treasurer Filed Foreclosures for the same year, rounded to a whole percent. A case filed one year may not sell until a later one, so read this as that year's rate rather than the eventual fate of that year's exact cases.	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Median Home Value Median Home Value The midpoint value of owner-occupied homes — half the county's homes are worth more, half less. Source: the Census Bureau's American Community Survey 5-year estimates (table B25077), which reflect what owners estimate their home is worth, not sale prices. The year shown is the most recent one published.	$147,900	$149,300	$150,100	$153,100	$156,200	$160,200	$166,200	$189,600	$199,900	$214,100	—
% Value Change % Value Change Year-over-year change in the Median Home Value row above, rounded to the nearest whole percent. It is only computed when that year and the one before it both have a value, so it is never carried across a gap in the data.	—	1%	1%	2%	2%	3%	4%	14%	5%	7%	—
Assessment Ratio Assessment Ratio How close the county auditor's appraised values are to what homes actually sell for. The Ohio Department of Taxation compares the auditor's appraised value to the real sale price on arm's-length sales and publishes a median ratio for each city and township; this figure combines those into one county number, weighted by each area's number of sales. 100% means appraisals matched sale prices. 75% means the typical home was appraised at about three-quarters of what it sold for; above 100% means the typical home was appraised for more than it sold for. It describes the county as a whole — any individual property can be far off it. (Ohio bills tax on 35% of appraised value; that 35% is fixed by statute and is not what this ratio measures.)	90.19%	88.45%	86.17%	89.97%	85.79%	79.35%	84.1%	77.14%	73.51%	—	—

What This Data Means

Since 2015, 705 Lake County families have had a tax lien foreclosure filed against their home — each one a household at risk of losing everything over a debt to the county.
Tax lien foreclosures in Lake County have increased by 1625% since 2015.

Help stop this from happening to more Ohio families — find a petition signing location near you in Lake County.

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About this data: Data obtained from the Lake County Clerk of Courts' online case search, reflecting foreclosure cases filed by the Prosecutor's office on behalf of the County Treasurer, 2015–2025 (380 cases). Lake County sells its delinquent tax lien certificates as a single bundled portfolio under Ohio Revised Code §§ 5721.30–5721.43. Two investors have held these certificates during the study period — Tax Ease Ohio (certificates sold prior to 2021, 251 cases filed) and NAR Solutions/NAR Ohio LLC (2021 to present, 74 cases filed) — confirmed by the Treasurer's own website: https://www.lakecountyohio.gov/treasurer/sold-tax-lien-certificates/ Median home value for 2025 is not available: the Census Bureau's American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (the source for this row) had not yet published that vintage as of this data's retrieval date. Assessment ratio data is not available for 2024-2025: neither of the Ohio Department of Taxation's sales-ratio studies (SRD04 or the archived PS1&2) covers those year(s) for this county.

Source: Lake County Clerk of Courts (Name Search case type). These are property tax lien foreclosures only — not mortgage foreclosures.

Assessment ratio: Ohio Department of Taxation, SRD04 — Residential Sales Statistics by Political Subdivision (2020–present) and PS1&2 — Sales Ratios of Real Property, By Class of Property and County (2015–2018, archived).

All data is sourced from publicly available government records including individual county court portals, the U.S. Census Bureau, and the Ohio Department of Taxation. AxOHTax makes no warranty as to the accuracy of compiled figures. Users should verify data independently for official purposes.