Was My House Sold for More Than I Owed?

The house is gone, maybe someone has already called about "leftover money," and now you want the actual number: what did it sell for? Here is how to look up your own sale result for free in Ohio and Georgia — and how the leftover-money math really works.

Updated July 10, 2026. Checked against the sources below
If your home sold at a foreclosure or tax sale for more than you owed, the leftover money — called surplus funds — legally belongs to you, not the bank or the county. The sale price is public record: in Ohio it is on your foreclosure case docket at the clerk of courts; in Georgia it is on the recorded foreclosure deed or the county excess funds list. Checking is free.

How do I find out if my house was sold for more than I owed?

You need two numbers, and both are public record: what the house sold for, and what you owed on it the day it sold. If the first number is bigger, the difference — after sale costs and any other liens are paid — is money owed to you. That leftover money is called surplus funds — also called excess proceeds, excess funds, or an overage. Counties use different words for the same thing: whatever was left of your home equity after the debt was paid.

Nobody reliably tracks you down to hand it over. Notices get mailed to the foreclosed address — a house you no longer live in. At a Franklin County court hearing cited in the Columbus Dispatch's "Foreclosed and Fleeced" investigation, it was estimated that roughly 95% of former owners never learn money was left over from their foreclosure. The fix is to look up your own sale result. In Ohio, the sale price sits in your foreclosure case file at the county clerk of courts. In Georgia, it is on the recorded foreclosure deed or the county's excess funds list. Both lookups are free, and the steps below walk through each one.

How is the leftover money calculated after a foreclosure or tax sale?

The math is subtraction. Start with the winning bid at the auction. Subtract everything with a legal right to be paid first: the debt that forced the sale (in Ohio, the court's judgment amount with interest and fees; in Georgia, your loan payoff or the tax bill), the costs of running the sale, and any junior liens recorded against the property — a second mortgage, HELOC, HOA lien, or tax lien. Whatever remains is the surplus, and under both Ohio law (R.C. 2329.44) and Georgia law (O.C.G.A. § 44-14-190) it belongs to the former owner — not the bank, not the county. National consumer guides like Nolo explain the same rule.

Line itemExample amount
Winning bid at the auction$200,000
Debt that forced the sale (judgment or payoff, with interest and fees)- $160,000
Costs of the sale (court costs, sheriff's fees, advertising)- $8,000
Second mortgage (junior lien, paid next in line)- $12,000
Leftover money (surplus) belonging to the former owner= $20,000
These are made-up round numbers to show how the math works — not a real case, an average, or a promise of what any sale produces. Your result depends entirely on your sale price, your payoff, and the liens on your property.

How do I look up how much my house sold for at the sheriff sale in Ohio?

Every Ohio mortgage foreclosure is a court case, which means your sale result is sitting in a public court file right now. Two details about the deductions first: liens are paid in priority order and must prove their claims, and the "what you owed" figure is the judgment amount on the day of sale — not your original loan balance. Here is the lookup:

  1. Find your foreclosure case on the docket. Every Ohio county clerk of courts offers a free online case search — Cuyahoga County even has a dedicated sheriff sale search. Search your last name in the county where the house was; your foreclosure is the case where the lender (or the county treasurer, for taxes) sued you.
  2. Read the sale entries. Look for docket entries titled "Sheriff's Return of Sale," "Order Confirming Sale," or "Confirmation of Sale" — the winning bid is stated there. The "Judgment Entry and Decree in Foreclosure" earlier in the docket shows what you owed.
  3. Check the state auction site if your county sells online. Ohio's official online sheriff sale platform follows the pattern {county}.sheriffsaleauction.ohio.gov — for example, lorain.sheriffsaleauction.ohio.gov. Completed-sale results show the final bid.
  4. Call the clerk and ask two questions: "What did the property in my case sell for?" and "Are excess funds being held in my case?" In Franklin County, that is the Clerk of Courts at 614-525-3600, and the clerk's own excess funds page explains how to claim. Whatever you read anywhere — including here — confirm it with the county directly. We encourage it.
According to publicly available Ohio statute (R.C. 2329.44), leftover sale money is turned over to the clerk of courts within 45 days after the court confirms the sale, and for balances of $500 or more the clerk must send the former owner certified-mail notice of the amount and how to claim it. If it goes unclaimed after notice, it moves into county unclaimed funds — still recoverable, with extra steps. Tax foreclosures are harsher: under R.C. 5721.20, excess paid into the county treasury is permanently forfeited if the former owner does not demand it within 3 years. Confirm your case's specifics with your county — we encourage it.

How do I find out how much my house sold for at auction in Georgia?

Georgia works differently. Most mortgage foreclosures never pass through a court — the lender sells the house on the courthouse steps on the first Tuesday of the month. There is no court docket to search, but there is something just as good: the foreclosure deed. After the auction, the buyer records a "Deed Under Power" in the county deed records, and that document states the sale price. You can find it from home:

  1. Search the statewide deed index. The Georgia Superior Court Clerks' Cooperative Authority runs a statewide real estate index covering all 159 counties. Search your own name as the grantor in the county where the house was.
  2. Find the Deed Under Power. Look for a document recorded shortly after your sale date — typically titled "Deed Under Power" or "Deed Under Power of Sale." The price the house sold for is written in the deed.
  3. Compare it to what you owed. Your final payoff — loan balance plus interest, fees, and costs — is the number to beat. If the deed price is higher, the difference (after junior liens) should be paid to you under O.C.G.A. § 44-14-190.
  4. For a tax sale, check the county excess funds list. Georgia tax commissioners publish lists of tax sale excess funds — see Gwinnett, DeKalb, Chatham, and Fulton. If your name or old parcel is on the list, the county is holding money connected to it.
Who holds the money matters in Georgia. After a mortgage foreclosure, the surplus usually sits with the foreclosing lender's law firm — no government office is required to find you. After a tax sale, publicly available statute (O.C.G.A. § 48-4-5) requires written notice of excess funds within 30 days to the owner of record; the tax commissioner holds the money — often until the 12-month redemption period resolves — and unclaimed funds go to the Georgia Department of Revenue after 5 years. Call your county tax commissioner to confirm any of this for your own sale — we encourage it.

What if my house sold for less than I owed?

Honest answer: many foreclosure sales produce no leftover money at all, and you deserve to know why before anyone pitches you a recovery service. The most common reason is the lender's credit bid — the bank can bid up to the amount it is owed without bringing cash, and at many auctions it wins at exactly that number, leaving zero surplus. Auction prices also simply come in low: publicly available Ohio statute sets the minimum sheriff sale bid at two-thirds of appraised value (R.C. 2329.20), and a residential property unsold after two auctions can then be offered with no minimum bid at all (R.C. 2329.52). Georgia's courthouse-steps auctions have no court-set floor at all. And even when the bid beats the first mortgage, junior liens — a second mortgage, HELOC, HOA, or tax lien — are paid before you and can eat the entire difference.

If the house sold for less than you owed, the shortfall is called a deficiency, and in some cases a lender can ask a court to make you personally liable for it. Both states limit that. In Georgia, a lender cannot pursue a deficiency judgment unless it has the sale judicially confirmed within 30 days (O.C.G.A. § 44-14-161) — a step many lenders skip. In Ohio, a deficiency on a one- or two-family dwelling you lived in generally becomes unenforceable two years after the court confirms the sale (R.C. 2329.08). This is education, not legal advice — if you are being pursued for a deficiency, speak with a licensed attorney in your state about your specific situation.

One protective rule of thumb: the sale result is checkable before anyone signs anything. A caller who promises you money but cannot tell you your sale price, sale date, and case or deed reference has not done the ten minutes of homework above. And if the record shows no surplus, an honest company will tell you so and close the file — there is nothing to recover and nothing to charge for.

Do I need to pay someone to look this up or claim my money?

No. Everything in this guide — the docket search, the deed search, the excess funds lists, the phone calls — is free, and you can file the claim yourself for free too. In Ohio, you claim a mortgage-foreclosure surplus by filing a motion in your own foreclosure case, and Ohio Legal Help publishes a free motion form with instructions. In Georgia, you submit a claim directly to the county tax commissioner (tax sales) or to the law firm or court holding the funds (mortgage sales). No county charges you to claim your own money.

Where help genuinely earns its keep is the complicated middle: the owner passed away and heirs need probate paperwork before anyone can be paid, competing lienholders push the funds into a court fight called an interpleader, you have moved out of state, or the county restricts who may file at all. Several Georgia counties — Gwinnett among them — accept excess funds claims only from the owner of record or a licensed attorney and turn away third-party "recovery agents." That is exactly how we operate: our own licensed attorneys file claims in Ohio and Georgia, including in the Georgia counties that only accept filings from owners or attorneys. No upfront costs — attorney fees, filing fees, and court costs are all covered by us. You pay nothing unless money is actually recovered.

Keep reading

Sources

Common questions

Straight answers, before you ask.

In Ohio, look up your foreclosure case for free on your county clerk of courts' online docket — the "Sheriff's Return of Sale" or "Confirmation of Sale" entry states the winning bid. Counties that auction online post results at {county}.sheriffsaleauction.ohio.gov. Or call the clerk with your name and old address and ask what the property sold for and whether excess funds are held in your case.

The auction buyer records a foreclosure deed — usually titled "Deed Under Power" — in the county deed records, and it states the sale price. You can search your name for free in the GSCCCA statewide real estate index at search.gsccca.org. If it was a tax sale, check your county tax commissioner's published excess funds list for your name or parcel.

After the foreclosing debt, sale costs, and any junior liens are paid in priority order, the remainder — the surplus — legally belongs to the former owner or their heirs. Ohio directs it to the judgment debtor under R.C. 2329.44, and Georgia's O.C.G.A. § 44-14-190 says the surplus "shall be paid to the mortgagor." It never automatically becomes the bank's or the county's money.

Three common reasons: junior liens like a second mortgage, HELOC, HOA, or tax lien were paid out of the difference first; the "sold for more" figure was rumor rather than the recorded bid — often the lender credit-bid exactly what it was owed, leaving nothing; or a surplus exists but no claim was ever filed for it. Your court file or deed record shows which one applies, and checking is free.

Yes. Court dockets and deed records do not disappear, so the lookup works years later. Whether the money is still claimable depends on deadlines: unclaimed Ohio mortgage surplus moves into county unclaimed funds and generally remains recoverable, but Ohio tax sale excess is permanently forfeited three years after it reaches the county treasury (R.C. 5721.20), and unclaimed Georgia tax sale excess goes to the Department of Revenue after five years (O.C.G.A. § 48-4-5). Check now, and confirm your deadline with the county.

Do not sign anything on the phone. Verify the claim yourself in about ten minutes, free: in Ohio, pull your case docket at the county clerk of courts and read the confirmation-of-sale entry; in Georgia, search the GSCCCA deed index for the foreclosure deed or check the tax commissioner's excess funds list. If the numbers check out, the money is yours to claim with or without that caller — and no legitimate company asks you to pay anything upfront.

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