Sheriff Rochelle Bilal told City Council that deed-processing problems have been resolved. Buyers across Philly say that’s not true.

At a City Council budget hearing this week, Sheriff Rochelle Bilal floated a new theory for why winning bidders at property auctions have waited up to a year to receive their deeds.

She accused sheriff sale buyers of jamming up the process by failing to submit required forms or fees, then trying to “get to the head of the line” by complaining about delays or petitioning the courts.

“If you believe them that run to the newspaper — ‘Oh I ain’t got my deed’ — well they never tell them they didn’t pay the invoice,” Bilal told Councilmember Cindy Bass on Tuesday.

For her part, Bilal said the widespread deed-processing problems — which began in 2023 and later triggered several lawsuits — have been fixed and sheriff sales are now going “full blast.”

Buyers across the city say that’s not true.

Interviews this week with a dozen real estate agents, investors, and attorneys, as well as court documents and city records, indicate the deed delays and other complications are ongoing — and not due solely to missing paperwork or late payments.

Some said the logjam has actually gotten worse since The Inquirer started tracking the problem in mid-2024.

Edward Levin, a real estate agent with American Destiny Real Estate, which resells homes following mortgage foreclosures, said Bilal’s testimony was “so far from the truth it’s disturbing.”

Levin said he has about 10 properties under contract to sell, but has been unable to close the deals because the sheriff’s office won’t provide the deeds.

He said he can’t get answers from Bilal’s staff, City Council staff or any other city official.

“I keep trying to find someone who will listen,” Levin said. “Everyone is just turning a blind eye to it. It’s frustrating on my end.”

Despite these persistent complaints, and a spate of other incidents that have marred Bilal’s tenure, the sheriff received universal praise in Council chambers this week, as she sought a 54% increase to her office’s budget, more than any other city department.

Council President Kenyatta Johnson was absent for most of Bilal’s testimony while handling other legislative business, but appeared in the final minutes to thank Bilal. Other council members remarked on how well her office is functioning.

“The city of Philadelphia works because you all work,” Bass said.

Neither Bilal nor Bass responded to requests for comment for this article.

Problems with sheriff sales have been a recurring theme since Bilal took office in 2020. Tax-delinquency sales were halted altogether for three years, while other auctions were marred by delays.

In 2023, the office entered into a $7.5 million software contract with Tyler Technologies, purportedly to streamline the process.

In July 2024, Bilal told The Inquirer that she was taking “corrective action” to address lengthy delays in recording deeds, attributing them to an undisclosed “staffing error.”

Then, last September, Bilal’s spokesperson said the problems had been “identified and corrected.”

In response to questions about reports of continuing delays, the sheriff told Council that banks were deliberately dragging their feet following mortgage-foreclosure auctions in order to avoid paying until they had a new buyer lined up.

Mary Jo Potts, a foreclosure specialist at Elfant Wissahickon Realtors who resells those properties, said this is not true. She said those delays actually drive away prospective buyers who don’t want to wait a year or more to settle.

“Nothing has really improved,” Potts said.

The delays can also attract squatters and contribute to blight as vacant homes deteriorate and trash piles up, she said.

“I have a property where it has been over two years that we’ve been waiting for a deed,” Potts said. “Some aren’t even going on the market until the deeds are collected because it’s so hard to keep a buyer.”

When it comes to sheriff sales of tax-delinquent properties, Bilal told Council those delays are caused by buyers failing to submit a required form showing they are paid up on city taxes.

But some buyers say they’ve still waited for months to get a deed after they submit the tax-compliance forms, leaving them unable to access the properties, make any repairs or resell or rent them.

Rachel Shlayen, a real estate investor, said she experienced no major problems at in-person tax sales held by former Sheriff Jewell Williams. But after Bilal was elected and moved to an online auction format during COVID, delays of up to eight months became the norm.

Shlayen said she has given up bidding on properties in Philadelphia.

“I have not had one easy tax-sale property purchase since things went virtual,” Shlayen said. “The process has been a complete disaster. I don’t want to do it anymore. There’s too much follow-up needed from me and no accountability on the city side.”

The slowdown in land dispensation has coincided with $76 million increase in property taxes owed to the city since 2020, as delinquent properties sit unsold.

This year, sheriff’s deed filings have remained flat, averaging about three a day. Overall filings have fallen 76% since 2019, when the office processed the equivalent of about 12 deeds a day, on average.

Bilal has also blamed buyers for tardiness in paying down liens and other required fees in advance of a deed transfer.

But in a lawsuit filed in March, the purchaser of eight auctioned properties for nearly $1 million stated that the sheriff’s office was more than two months behind in providing invoices detailing these costs, known as schedules of distribution, let alone processing payments.

“Sheriff’s Department officials have not provided any explanation for the delay,” the suit asserts.

In suburban Philadelphia counties, the deed-recording process typically takes about 60 days after auction, according to the suit.

Even so, the office has continued to list far more properties for sale than it can process in a given month. As a result, it could be difficult to reduce the backlog of properties that have been sold at auction but not yet deeded to their new owners.

Clayton Pronold, a Philadelphia lawyer who represents mortgage servicing companies, strongly disputed Bilal’s assertion that the banks were causing ongoing delays in foreclosure auctions.

“That’s absolutely not true,” Pronold said.

While there can always be minor delays on both sides of a transaction, Pronold said banks want to get properties resold as quickly as possible — not have them stuck in limbo with the sheriff’s office.

Pronold said he is also representing a third-party buyer who paid the sheriff’s office more than $500,000 for five properties in November 2025, two weeks after the mortgage-foreclosure auction. The buyer still hasn’t received the deed.

“Whatever the hell she told them is not accurate,” Pronold said of Bilal’s testimony. “Good to hear our City Council is just falling for this.”

Acknowledgment

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