‘Death by a thousand paper cuts’ for Illinois landlords with new laws

[December 27, 2024]  By Catrina Barker | The Center Square contributor

(The Center Square) – Property owners will see about a dozen of the nearly 300 new Illinois laws taking effect Jan. 1, impacting them and their relationships with tenants.

House Bill 4768 prohibits landlords from retaliating against a tenant, if that tenant complains about living conditions. On the Senate floor, state Sen. Andrew Chesney, R-Freeport, said policies like this make affordable housing impossible for Illinoisans.

"What this bill does is if someone complains to the landlord and the landlord fixes it, it opens the landlord up to litigation. They could be open to litigation if he or she doesn’t renew the lease or raises their rent,” said Chesney. “This is all to bully landlords into not raising rents. Ultimately who pays for this are all the people we represent who are of modest means.”

State Rep. Will Guzzardi, D-Chicago, carried the measure in the House and said 40 out of 50 states in the nation have similar protections against retaliatory eviction.

“So we're talking about a tenant whose heat gets cut off in the winter, they complain to the landlord, the landlord does nothing, they complain to the city, the city comes out, and then they get an eviction notice the next day,” said Guzzardi.

If the landlord cannot show that there was a non-retaliatory reason for taking action against the tenant, then the courts can award damages to the tenant who made the initial complaint.

State Rep. Travis Weaver, R-Edwards, who used to be a landlord, said there are a whole host of reasons why landlords terminate someone’s lease. Weaver said that it’s a “bridge too far” to hold landlords punitively liable in court where a tenant might not share the whole story.

State Rep. Anna Moeller’s House Bill 4926 will go into effect Jan. 1.

“To prohibit a landlord from charging an application screening fee if an applicant provides a properly prepared reusable tenant screening report, with all the necessary information to the landlord,” said Moeller, D-Elgin. “This legislation is an effort to reduce the cost to prospective tenants when they’re in the market for an apartment.”

Opponents expressed concern that a reusable report might contain information that is no longer accurate, such as a tenant's eviction history, credit score or criminal background that can change over time.

House Bill 4206 mandates landlords allow tenants to make rental payments by delivering a paper check to the landlord, if the landlord uses a third-party payment portal to collect rent and has a transactional fee. State Sen. Rachel Ventura, D-Joliet, carried the measure in the spring.

"There’s a number of online electronic portals that don’t require additional fees, such as Zelle. This is really meant to make sure landlords aren’t increasing the rent by 2-3% by saying there’s fees for using electronic payment, when in fact they aren’t charged the 2-3% fees and really it’s a way to increase rent,” said Ventura.

Opponents expressed concern that the legislation didn’t include protections for landlords, who could be forced, under this law, to accept counterfeit bills or fake checks.

Senate Bill 2601 will go into effect Jan. 1. State Rep. Abdelnasser Rashid’s bill mandates property owners disclose to potential tenants if a property is located in a FEMA Flood Hazard area.

“With climate change making floods much more common and extreme, this is one important step we can take to protect working families. Just one flooding event can be financially devastating for a family,” said Rashid, D-Bridgeview.

Weaver said regulations are causing people to leave the state, and that this bill alone wouldn’t break the camel's back, but Illinois has a problem with “death by a thousand paper cuts,” when it comes to small business regulation.