Real Estate Law

(Nekritz, D-Buffalo Grove; Steans, D-Chicago) makes a number of changes to this Act. (1) Exempts from FOIA any information collected by the Department of Financial and Professional Regulation. This exemption does not extend to educational, training, and outreach material, statistical data, or operational information maintained by the Department in administering the Act. (2) Clarifies that neither the Ombudsperson nor the Department has the authority to consider matters that may constitute unlawful discrimination under local, State, or federal law. (3) Makes numerous technical changes including deleting the registration requirement by an entity. (4) Pushes back the repeal date of the entire Act by one year to July 1, 2022. Passed both chambers. 

(Althoff, R-Crystal Lake; Tryon, R-Crystal Lake) requires a copy of a lis pendens for a residential mortgage foreclosure in the program area to be filed electronically with the Department of Financial and Professional Regulation after July 1, 2016. Passed both chambers. 

(Althoff, R-McHenry; Nekritz, D-Buffalo Grove) extends the sunset for current law until December 31, 2020. It requires work to be done or materials furnished to obtain a lien within three years for residential property and five years for any other kind of property. Passed both chambers. 

(Biss, D-Skokie; Williams, D-Chicago) makes the following changes to the Act.

(1) Expands the definition of protected “personal information” to include a person’s first name or first initial and the last name that is encrypted or redacted but the unlocking keys have been breached if one of several “data elements” have also been unlawfully acquired. (2) Expands “data elements” to include medical information, health insurance information, unique biometric data. (3) Expands protected “personal information” to include user name or email address and password or security question information that permits a person’s online accounts to be breached. (4) Requires a data collector that owns or licenses, or maintains or stores but does not own or license, records that contain personal information of Illinois resident to implement and maintain reasonable security measures to protect those records from unauthorized access or use. (5) Compliance with the federal HIPAA complies with this Act as long as the covered entity provides notice of a breach to the Illinois Attorney General within notifying the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Effective January 1, 2017. 

(Lang, D-Skokie; Link, D-Gurnee) amends the Uniform Disposition of Unclaimed Property Act. It presumes that a United States savings bond is presumed abandoned if the bond has remained unclaimed and unredeemed for five years after its date of final extended maturity. Establishes a procedure by which the State Treasurer may obtain a judicial determination that the bond has escheated to the State. Passed both chambers. 

(Moeller, D-Elgin; Bush, D-Grayslake) requires the park owner to give the tenant written notice specifying the reason for any fine that may be imposed on the tenant if the tenant breaches any provision of the lease or park rules. “Fine” does not include any fees that are imposed on a tenant for services or products provided by the park owner to the tenant.

If a fine is imposed on a tenant, the following applies for 45 days after written notice of the fine is delivered to the tenant: (1) non-payment of a fine is not grounds for refusal to accept a rent payment; and (2) the fine may not be deducted from a rent payment. Acceptance of a rent payment may not be construed as a waiver of an unpaid fine. Passed both chambers. 

The Access to Justice Act created the Statutory Court Fee Task Force to study the current system of fees, fines, and other court costs and propose recommendations to the Illinois General Assembly and Illinois Supreme Court. Its report may be found at the URL below.