Insecure in Your Own Home: What It Means to Rent in Illinois

Lockouts, forcible entry, and security deposit disputes are common occurrences for Illinois renters, according to a new report called Insecure in Your Own Home: What It Means to Rent in Illinois, released by the Illinois Tenants Rights Working Group. The report calls attention to the experiences statewide of survey respondents who lack the basic consumer protections for safe, stable, and secure housing.

The statewide tenant survey was conducted by the Housing Action Illinois, Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing, and Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law, all part of the Illinois Tenants Rights Working Group, to determine how best to improve the landlord-tenant relationship and the quality of life for Illinois renters. Typical respondents lived in an unsubsidized property that was not owner-occupied. They had a family size between two and three and made $10,000 per year or less.

The most appalling statistic is the number of people who have been “locked out” of their homes. Lockouts are illegal evictions where landlords take the law into their own hands and oust tenants from their homes without notice or their day in court. One in twelve of the respondents had been locked out at some point. Other experiences of survey respondents were having their rent raised or being evicted as a form of retaliation, being threatened with utility shutoff, landlords entering apartments without permission, and lack of repairs. An analysis shows that nearly half (48 percent) of all respondents experienced at least one of these forms of abuse. A high percentage of respondents did not know the right and responsibilities of tenants (37 percent) and landlords (42 percent).

The report also reveals that renters lack basic consumer protections, with low-income households bearing the brunt of tenant problems. The combination of having too little money to afford a decent home and having some unprincipled landlords taking advantage of that fact forces too many families to live in deplorable conditions or on the streets. “This shows that the affordable-housing crisis makes landlord-tenant issues more relevant than ever,” said Douglas Schenkelberg of the Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing. “By demonstrating the need for a comprehensive understanding of the landlord-tenant relationship, we can now continue to recommend specific policies that ensure that all Illinois families have access to stable, safe, and secure housing.”

Based on the report’s findings, the Illinois Tenants Rights Working Group is recommending that Illinois

1. adopt a comprehensive Residential Landlord-Tenant Act;
2. expand protections against retaliatory evictions;
3. adopt a statewide property maintenance code;
4. expand resources for education on landlords’ and tenants’ rights and responsibilities;
5. increase resources for alternative dispute resolution and legal representation; and
6. expand the amount of safe, decent, and affordable housing available.

The working group is advocating that policies and resources be increased to educate landlords and tenants alike on what their rights and responsibilities are. Over 25 states including Iowa, Michigan, and Nebraska have enacted legislation that gives tenants stronger protections than those in Illinois, and most of these protections have been in place for some 30 years.

Through a new Residential Tenant Protection Act introduced by Rep. William Davis (D –30th) tenants would be protected against unlawful evictions, in which landlords remove property, change locks, shut off utilities, or engage in other actions to make units uninhabitable and force their tenants out. The Act would solidify the Forcible Entry and Detainer Act as the only proper legal method in Illinois for removing tenants from a dwelling unit if the tenants fail to live up to their end of the rental agreement.

Currently, several municipal ordinances including Chicago’s s protect more than half of Illinois tenants, and parts of the state without home rule authority are unable to protect their residents from these illegal evictions. Representative Davis’s bill intends to protect tenants not currently covered by local ordinances and offer them the same type of rights and remedies as most tenants in Illinois already enjoy.

For more information, contact Kate Walz.