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  Your Guide to Landlord-Tenant Law
  
  Landlord-Tenant Law
  
  At some point throughout their lives many people will be involved with the leasing of realty, either as property owner or tenant. Laws that affect landlords and occupants can differ substantially from city to city. This handout supplies basic details about being an occupant in Illinois. You need to talk to a lawyer or your town or county as they may provide you with higher protection under the law.
  
  Tenancy Agreement
  
  The relationship between property manager and tenant occurs from an agreement, written or oral, by which one party inhabits the property of another with the owner's permission in return for the payment of particular amount as rent.
  
  Written Agreement: Most occupancies remain in writing and are called a lease. No particular words are essential to produce a lease, however typically the regards to a lease consist of a description of the property, the length of the contract, the quantity of the lease, and the time of payment. TIP: You should put your arrangement in composing to prevent future misconceptions.
  
  Provisions in a lease arrangement that protect a proprietor from liability for damages to individuals or residential or commercial property triggered by the neglect of the property owner are considered as being against public policy and are therefore unenforceable. Certain towns and counties have other limitations and restriction on specific lease terms, so you ought to seek advice from an attorney or your town or county.
  
  Oral Agreement: If an occupancy agreement is not in writing, the term of the agreement will, usually, be thought about a month-to-month occupancy. The period is generally figured out by the frequency of the rental payments. For instance: week to week, month to month, or year to year. Although the regards to an oral lease might be tough to determine, a party might be bound to the terms of an oral contract simply as much as a written one.
  
  Termination of the Lease or Tenancy Agreement
  
  If a lease is not for a particular term, it may be terminated by either celebration with appropriate notice.
  
  - For year-to-year occupancies, other than a lease of farmland, either celebration may terminate the lease by offering 60 days of composed notice at any time within the 4 months preceding the last 60 days of the lease.
• A week-to-week occupancy may be ended by either party by providing seven days of written notice to the other celebration.
• Farm leases usually run for one year. Customarily, they start and end in March of each year. Notice to end should be provided a minimum of 4 months before the end of the term.
• In all other lease agreements for a duration of less than one year, a celebration needs to offer thirty days of composed notification. Any notice offered ought to call for termination on the last day of that rental period.
• The lease might likewise have stated requirements and timeframe for termination of the lease.
• In specific municipalities and counties, property owners are required to give more than the above mentioned notice duration for termination. You must talk to an attorney or your town or county.
  
  If the lease does mention a particular expiration or termination date, no termination notice is required. Know that your lease may also need notice of termination in a specific form or a greater notice period than the minimum needed by law, if any. Landlords ought to keep in mind that no matter what the lease needs or mentions, you might be needed to give more than the notification period mentioned in the lease for termination and in composing. You should seek advice from an attorney or your town or county.
  
  Termination of a month-to-month tenancy typically just requires thirty days of notification by occupant and a proprietor is needed to serve a written notification of termination of occupancy on the occupant (see Service as needed section below). In certain municipalities and counties, landlords are needed to provide more than 30 days of notice, so you should seek advice from talk to an attorney or your municipality or county.
  
  Renewal of the Lease or Tenancy Agreement, Rental Increases
  
  Generally, a lease might be renewed at any time by oral or written arrangement of the celebrations. If a lease term expires and the property owner accepts rent following the expiration of the term, the lease term immediately becomes month-to-month based on the very same terms set forth in the lease.
  
  The lease might require a specific notice and timeframe for restoring the lease. You should evaluate your lease to confirm such requirements. Landlords and tenants must note that no matter what the lease needs or specifies, landlords might also have restrictions on how early they can need renewal of a lease by a tenant and are needed to put such in composing. You must talk to a lawyer or your town or county.
  
  Month-to-month occupancies instantly renew from month to month till ended by either landlord or tenant.
  
  Unless there is a composed lease, a property owner can raise the lease by any quantity by providing the occupant notification: Seven days of notification for a week-to-week tenancy, one month of notice for a month-to-month occupancy, and 90 days of notification for mobile home parks. In particular municipalities and counties, property owners are required to provide more than 7 or thirty days of notification of a rental increase, so you should seek advice from with speak with a lawyer or your municipality or county.
  
  Eviction, Termination of Tenants Right to Possession
  
  In Illinois, a property owner does not have a right to self-help and should file an eviction to remove an occupant or occupant from the properties.
  
  Five-Day Notice. The most common breach of a lease is for non-payment of lease. In this case the proprietor must serve a five-day notice upon the overdue occupant unless the lease requires more than five days of notification. Five days after such notice is served, the proprietor might begin eviction procedures against the renter. If, nevertheless, the tenant pays the total of lease demanded in the five-day notice within those five days, the property owner may not proceed with an eviction. The proprietor is not needed, however, to accept lease that is less than the exact quantity due. If the property owner accepts a tender of a lesser amount of rent, it might affect the rights to proceed under the notification.
  
  10-Day Notice. If a property manager wants to terminate a lease because of a violation of the lease contract by the tenant, aside from for non-payment of rent, he or she must serve 10 days of composed notice upon the renter before eviction procedures can begin, unless the lease requires more than 10 days of notification. Acceptance of lease after such notification is a waiver by the property manager of the right to end the lease unless the breach experienced is a continuing breach.
  
  Holdover. If an occupant remains beyond the lease expiration date, generally, a property owner might submit an eviction without having to first serve a notice on the renter. However, the terms of the lease or in specific towns or counties, a landlord is required to provide a notification of non-renewal to the renter, so you ought to talk to an attorney or your town or county.
  
  Service on Demand Notice
  
  The five-day, 10-day, or termination of month-to-month tenancy notifications may be served upon occupant by providing a composed or printed copy to the occupant, leaving the very same with some person above the age of 13 years who lives at the celebration's house, or sending out a copy of the to the celebration by certified or signed up mail with a return receipt from the addressee. If no one remains in the real ownership of the facilities, then publishing notice on the facilities suffices.
  
  Subletting or Assigning the Lease
  
  Often, composed leases prohibit the renter from subletting the facilities without the written authorization of the property manager. Such consent can not be unreasonably kept, however the restriction is enforceable under the law. If there is no such prohibition, then an occupant might sublease or designate their lease to another. In such cases, however, the occupant will remain responsible to the landlord unless the property owner releases the original tenant. A breach of the sublease will not alter the preliminary relationship in between the proprietor and occupant.
  
  Breach by Landlord, Tenant Remedies
  
  If the property manager has actually breached the lease by failing to satisfy their tasks under the lease, certain solutions emerge in favor of the renter:
  
  - The renter might take legal action against the landlord for damages sustained as an outcome of the breach.
• If a proprietor fails to keep a leased home in a habitable condition, the renter might have the ability to abandon the premises and end the lease under the theory of "positive expulsion."
• The failure of a property owner to keep a rented residence in a habitable condition or comply substantially with regional housing codes may be a breach of the proprietor's "suggested guarantee of habitability" (independent of any composed lease provisions or oral guarantees), which the renter may assert as a defense to an eviction based on the non-payment of lease or a claim for reduction in the rental value of the premises. However, breach by proprietor does not immediately entitle an occupant to keep lease or a reduction in the rental worth. The commitment to pay lease continues as long as the tenant stays in the leased premises and to assert this defense successfully, the renter will have to reveal that their damages resulting from property manager's breach of this "implied guarantee" equal or go beyond the rent declared due.
  
  A proprietor's breach and tenant's damages might be challenging to prove. Because of the minimal and technical nature of these rules, tenants must be very cautious in withholding lease and needs to probably do so just after speaking with a lawyer.
  
  Please note that particular towns or counties offer specific obligations and requirements that the property owner need to carry out. If a landlord fails to abide by such commitments or requirements, the tenant may have additional solutions for such failure. You must seek advice from with a lawyer or your town or county.
  
  Breach by the Tenant, Landlord Remedies
  
  In addition to termination for certain breaches by tenant, a proprietor also has the following treatments:
  
  If lease is not paid, the proprietor might: (1) demand the rent due or to end up being due in the future and (2) terminate the lease and gather any previous lease due. Under certain situations in case of non-payment of rent the property owner might hold the furnishings and personal residential or commercial property of the renter till past rent is paid by the occupant.
  
  If a tenant stops working to vacate the leased facility at the end of the lease term, the occupant may become accountable for double rent for the duration of holdover if the holdover is considered to be willful. The tenant can likewise be forced out.
  
  If the renter damages the premises, the property owner might demand the repair of such damages.
  
  Please note that particular towns or counties offer particular commitments and requirements that the renter must meet. If a renter stops working to comply with such obligations or requirements, the property owner may have extra solutions for such failure. You should speak with a lawyer or your municipality or county.
  
  Discrimination
  
  Under the federal Fair Housing Act and Illinois law, it is illegal for a proprietor to discriminate in the leasing of a home house, flat, or house versus prospective renters who have children under the age of 14. It is likewise unlawful for a landlord to victimize a tenant on the basis of race, faith, sex, national origin, income, sexual origination, gender identity, or special needs.
  
  Down Payment, Move-in Fee
  
  Security Deposit. An occupant can be required to deposit with the property manager an amount of money prior to inhabiting the residential or commercial property. This is typically described as a down payment. This money is considered to be security for any damage to the properties or non-payment of lease. The security deposit does not eliminate the occupant of the responsibility to pay the last month's rent or for damage triggered to the properties. It should be gone back to the renter upon abandoning the premises if no damage has actually been done beyond regular wear and tear and the lease is fully paid.
  
  If a property owner stops working to return the down payment immediately, the tenant can sue to recover the portion of the security deposit to which the renter is entitled. In some towns or counties and certain scenarios under state law, when a property owner wrongfully keeps an occupant's down payment the tenant may be able to recover extra damages and attorneys' charges. You should talk to a legal representative.
  
  Generally, a landlord who receives a security deposit may not withhold any part of that deposit as payment for residential or commercial property damage unless he furnishes to the tenant, within 30 days of the date the occupant vacates, a statement of damage allegedly triggered by the occupant and the estimated or real cost of fixing or changing each product on that statement. If no such declaration is furnished within one month, the proprietor should return the down payment completely within 45 days of the date the renter vacated.
  
  If a building contains 25 or more residential systems, the proprietor must likewise pay interest on the deposit from the date it was paid, if held more than 67 months. Interest is determined at the rate paid by the biggest bank in Illinois, as determined by overall possessions, on a passbook security account.
  
  The above declarations regarding down payment are based on state law. However, some municipalities or counties may enforce extra responsibilities. For instance, Cook County, Evanston, Chicago, and Oak Park all have additional requirements that a landlord should abide by when taking down payment and supply high charges when a property owner stops working to comply.
  
  Move-in Fee. In addition to or as an alternative to a down payment, a proprietor might charge a move-in fee. Generally, there are no specific restrictions on the quantity of a move-in cost, nevertheless, particular towns or counties do provide limitations. TIP: A move-in fee must be nonrefundable, otherwise it could be deemed to be a security deposit.
  
  Landlord and tenant matters can become complex. Both property manager and renter must seek advice from an attorney for support with particular issues. For more information about your rights and obligations as a tenant, consisting of specific landlord-tenant laws in your town or county, contact your local bar association, or go to the Illinois Tenants Union at www.tenant.org.
  
  Additional Resources
  
  - Illinois Lawyer Finder: isba.org/public/illinoislawyerfinder
• Illinois Legal Aid Online (ILAO): illinoislegalaid.org
• Illinois Standardized Court Forms: illinoiscourts.gov/ approved-forms.
• Illinois Court Help: ilcourthelp.gov.
• Illinois Free Legal Answers: il.freelegalanswers.org
  faqtoids.com
  Prepared by the Illinois State Bar Association's Real Estate Law Section (2024 )
  
  This handout is ready and published by the Illinois State Bar Association as a civil service. Every effort has actually been made to provide accurate details at the time of publication.