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land sold to the Trinity River Authority in a voluntary
transaction was so excludable. The difference in outcome turned
on whether the Trinity River Authority had the power to condemn,
as it did in respect of the warrants whose interest was not
excludable and did not have in respect of the warrants whose
interest was excludable. Id. at 1124.
In the case at hand, there was a voluntary bargain or
contract, as petitioner insists. Each of the tax certificates
issued by Pasco County was a contract between the county and
petitioner, purchased at auction by petitioner by reason of
having submitted the lowest bid in terms of the rate of interest
he was willing to accept.11 State ex rel. Seville Holding Co. v.
Draughon, 173 So. 353, 354 (Fla. 1937); see also In re General
Dev. Corp., 147 Bankr. 610, 613 (Bankr. S.D. Fla. 1992).
However, the voluntary bargain that petitioner entered into with
the county arose out of petitioner’s having made the lowest bid
11 We note that one of the components of the face amount
paid by the buyer of a tax sale certificate to the issuer is
interest accrued at the statutorily fixed rate of 18 percent from
the date of delinquency until the date of sale of the
certificate. Fla. Stat. Ann. sec. 197.172(1) (West 1989 & Supp.
1997). This interest rate is statutorily fixed, just like the
rate of interest paid on obligations incurred in the exercise of
eminent domain. However, the interest component accruing prior
to the sale of the certificate has no bearing on whether the
holder of the tax certificate entered into the contract
voluntarily; it is part of the face amount of the certificate.
The interest component that bears on the purchaser’s bargain is
the rate of interest bid at auction, which accrues from the date
of the auction until the date of redemption of the tax
certificate.
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