AuctionBuyers

DRAFT — NOT LEGAL ADVICE — ATTORNEY REVIEW REQUIRED

This document was drafted by a non-attorney assistant to accelerate review. It is not legal advice and is not final or legally sufficient. A licensed attorney must review, correct, and approve it before it is published or relied upon. Bracketed tags marked [ATTORNEY REVIEW] flag points that require a lawyer's judgment.

AuctionBuyers — Terms of Service (Consumer)

Property: auctionbuyers.com (the "Site" or "Service") Provider: [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — insert the legal entity name once the LLC is formed (see the open-items checklist in docs/legal/README.md). Referred to below as "we," "us," or "AuctionBuyers." Effective date: [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — insert on publication. Last updated: DRAFT (not yet published).

Welcome to AuctionBuyers. These Terms of Service ("Terms") are a legal agreement between you and AuctionBuyers governing your use of the Site, including search, filters, saved searches, favorites, and email alerts for real property auction and pre-foreclosure records. By using the Site or creating an account, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, do not use the Site.

1. What AuctionBuyers is — informational only

AuctionBuyers helps you find and track real property auctions (foreclosure, tax, and sheriff sales) and pre-foreclosure records sourced from public records and public notices. The Site is provided for general informational purposes only.

AuctionBuyers is NOT:

  • not legal advice — nothing on the Site is legal advice or creates an attorney-client relationship;
  • not investment, financial, or tax advice — auction purchases carry significant risk (title defects, liens, occupancy, condition, redemption rights, and more), and we do not advise you on any purchase;
  • not a title search, appraisal, or an official government record.

You are solely responsible for your own decisions. Consult qualified professionals (an attorney, a title company, a financial advisor) before bidding or buying.

2. Verify before you bid

Auction details change constantly and without notice — sales are frequently postponed, rescheduled, or canceled, and some records come from sources that do not publish updates. Data on the Site may be delayed, incomplete, or inaccurate.

Before you rely on any listing — and especially before you bid — you must confirm every detail (date, time, location, status, terms, and the property itself) directly with the official source (the court, sheriff, trustee, clerk, or the official auction venue). Each listing shows a last-verified timestamp to help you do this. We are not responsible for losses arising from reliance on Site data that turned out to be outdated or wrong.

3. FCRA — not a consumer reporting agency

AuctionBuyers is NOT a consumer reporting agency under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1681 et seq. ("FCRA"), and nothing on the Site is a "consumer report."

You may not use the Site or its data to make, or as a factor in, any decision about a person's eligibility for credit, insurance, employment, housing or tenant screening / rental, or any other FCRA "permissible purpose," or any similar decision under state consumer-reporting or "mini-FCRA" laws. We provide no FCRA certifications or compliance mechanisms. This Section survives termination. [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — confirm citation and any state mini-FCRA carve-outs.

4. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

  • (a) use the Site unlawfully or in violation of any law, regulation, or third-party right;
  • (b) scrape, crawl, harvest, or bulk-download Site content except as expressly permitted, or use bots to circumvent access controls or rate limits;
  • (c) resell, redistribute, or republish Site content, or use it to build a competing product;
  • (d) use the Site's data to unlawfully solicit or harass any person, including distressed homeowners — if you contact homeowners or consumers based on information found here, you alone are responsible for complying with all applicable solicitation, foreclosure-consultant, homeowner-protection, telemarketing, "do-not-call," CAN-SPAM, and TCPA laws (see also the AuctionScrapers API Terms, Section 10);
  • (e) attempt to breach security, probe for vulnerabilities, or interfere with the Site's operation;
  • (f) misuse or attempt to defeat account, subscription, or entitlement controls.

5. Accounts

You must provide accurate account information and keep your credentials secure. You are responsible for activity under your account. You must be at least 18. We may suspend or terminate accounts that violate these Terms.

6. Subscriptions, billing, and free tier — PLACEHOLDER (billing not live yet)

[ATTORNEY REVIEW] / PLACEHOLDER — billing is not live at initial launch. Paid subscriptions are planned but not yet active. When billing goes live, the following will apply and must be finalized by counsel before any charge is made:

  • Free tier: available without a payment card; limited features (e.g., delayed data, one county alert, daily digest). Exact free/paid feature split is set by product configuration and may change.
  • Paid subscriptions ("Pro"): billed monthly or annually through our third-party payment processor (Stripe). By subscribing, you authorize recurring charges until you cancel.
  • Auto-renewal: subscriptions renew automatically at the then-current price unless canceled before the renewal date. [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — auto-renewal disclosure and consent must satisfy federal ROSCA and state automatic-renewal laws (e.g., California, Connecticut); include clear pre-checkout disclosure, affirmative consent, and an easy cancellation path.
  • Cancellation: you may cancel anytime via the self-serve customer portal; cancellation stops future renewals and takes effect at the end of the current billing period.
  • Refunds: [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — state refund policy (e.g., no refunds except where required by law) once finalized.
  • Taxes: prices may be subject to sales/use tax. [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — Connecticut SaaS/data-processing tax treatment; confirm with a CPA (see the open-items checklist in docs/legal/README.md).
  • Price changes: we will give advance notice of price changes; continued paid use after the effective date constitutes acceptance.

Until billing is live, references to paid features are informational and no charges will be made.

7. Email alerts and communications

If you enable alerts, you consent to receive transactional and alert emails from us. Every marketing/alert email includes one-click unsubscribe, and we honor opt-outs as required by the CAN-SPAM Act. Transactional emails necessary to your account (e.g., receipts, security notices) may still be sent. [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — confirm consent, unsubscribe, and record-keeping meet CAN-SPAM and any applicable state requirements.

8. Removal requests and privacy

If you are a party to a matter shown on the Site and want your information suppressed, see our Privacy Policy and removal-request process (PRIVACY.md, Section 8). Removals and suppressions are processed at the data source by our upstream data provider; once applied there, the change flows through to the Site automatically.

9. Data accuracy disclaimer

The Site's data comes from third-party public sources and may be incomplete, delayed, misclassified, or inaccurate. We do not guarantee accuracy, completeness, or timeliness. See Section 2.

10. Disclaimer of warranties

THE SITE AND ALL CONTENT ARE PROVIDED "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE," WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, AND ACCURACY. WE DO NOT WARRANT THE SITE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, SECURE, OR ERROR-FREE.

11. Limitation of liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, AUCTIONBUYERS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR LOST PROFITS OR DATA, ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF THE SITE. OUR TOTAL LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF THE AMOUNTS YOU PAID US IN THE [ATTORNEY REVIEW] MONTHS BEFORE THE CLAIM OR [ATTORNEY REVIEW: floor amount]. Some jurisdictions limit these exclusions; they apply to the maximum extent permitted.

12. Indemnification

You will indemnify and hold harmless AuctionBuyers and its owners and agents from claims and expenses (including reasonable attorneys' fees) arising from your use of the Site, your violation of these Terms, or your violation of law (including in any outreach to homeowners or consumers). [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — scope for a consumer service.

13. Changes to these Terms and the Site

We may change the Site and these Terms prospectively. We will post the updated Terms and, for material changes, provide reasonable notice. Continued use after the effective date constitutes acceptance.

14. Governing law and disputes

[ATTORNEY REVIEW] — governing law, venue, arbitration, and class-action-waiver provisions, and any consumer-protection constraints on such clauses, to be set once the entity and state of formation are decided.

15. Contact

Questions: [ATTORNEY REVIEW] — insert support contact (e.g., support@auctionbuyers.com). Removal requests: see PRIVACY.md, Section 8.