Another sign of the struggling economy Monday, at Horry County's government and Justice Center.
It was the county's annual auction of properties with overdue taxes.
Monday's list of properties was very long especially compared to last year.
It was standing room only at the county's real estate auction to collect delinquent taxes.
County officials said, last year, there were around 500 properties on the tax sale list.
This year, there were more than 1,200 and nearly twice the number of bidders to buy real estate at cut-rate prices.
"Usually at the price they're paying or that they're bidding up to, it's still a very good deal compared to what market value is on these properties," Craig Dierksheide, Real Estate Agent, said.
Craig Dierksheide has been to a few of these tax sales but never seen one quite like the one on Monday. "In a tight economy, it seems like the people get behind on taxes and everything else and so there's more properties," Dierksheide said.
The list of properties would have been even longer, but some property owners managed to pay their taxes at the last minute to keep their homes off the auction block.
Some of the bidders were looking for property to develop, others for an inexpensive retirement home.
All of them say the size of Monday's crowd is a sign of the times. "Because again the economic times has some people in pretty bad shape," Robert Hill, Bidder from Charlotte, said.
Property owners are allowed one year to pay overdue taxes so the bidders can't touch their new properties for a year.
One may say the tax sale is a gamble.
"It is, like buying a lottery ticket," Craig Dierksheide said
With some winners and some losers.
There were so many properties on the tax sale, they didn't get through them all Monday. The auction will resume at 9 a.m. Tuesday.
