Pung v. Isabella County · ¶48

The Court today rightly rejects petitioner Michael Pung’s argument that anytime a government forecloses and sells an individual’s home to cover an outstanding tax debt, the Fifth Amendment Takings Clause requires the government to pay the home’s “hypothetical fair market value.” Ante, at 1. As the Court explains, surplus proceeds can be just compensation, assuming that the auction sale is “fairly conducted in light of our country’s history of tax sales.” Ibid. Based on this language, I do not read the Court’s opinion as identifying the contours of a fair auction, or endorsing the parties’ or the United States’ articulations of what this standard requires. The Court correctly leaves those issues for remand, should the Sixth Circuit find them preserved. See ante, at 11. With that understanding, I join the Court’s opinion.

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