28-Aug-21 – Chicago’s mom-and-pop landlords say the end of the eviction moratorium that was put in place to protect people who lost their jobs or got sick during the COVID-19 pandemic can’t come soon enough.

While a federal moratorium on evictions has ended, the Illinois ban, imposed by Governor J.B. Pritzker in March 2020, has been extended to October 3. The moratorium does not waive rent due, so residents must make up unpaid rents or they can seek rental assistance. Either way, the past due rent is still owed to the landlord.

Too many property owners are struggling with tenants who have racked up thousands of dollars in back rent, said Paul Arena, Director of Legislative Affairs for the Illinois Rental Property Owners Association (IRPOA), a lobbying organization that claims to represent the interests of more than 1,000 rental property owners in Illinois. Illinois landlords are the latest group to go to court to challenge the authority of federal health officials to use the COVID-19 pandemic to justify an order that bars rental property owners from removing tenants who refuse to pay rent.

The CDC lawsuit was filed in Chicago federal court on August 12 by Daniel Suhr, an attorney with the Chicago-based Liberty Justice Center, on behalf of the IRPOA and landlords Syed Rahman and Mark Weyermuller. The complaint notes that the CDC order came despite previous losses in court, in which federal judges ruled the CDC had exceeded its authority by imposing such a moratorium.

“Everyone is extremely upset by the moratorium and the philosophy that housing providers should bear the burden of this,” said Arena (left). “Many landlords are owed thousands of dollars in back rent and they have little hope of ever getting their money.”

Landlords and tenants both need help

“Landlords and tenants have both faced unprecedented financial pressures since the spring of 2020,” said Michael Mini, Executive Vice President of the Chicagoland Apartment Association. He says property owners have been working with tenants to setup payment plans, waive late fees, and extend grace periods to help those who were financially impacted. Rent relief and additional protections adopted by the courts and state and local governments, he says, will help both housing providers and residents.

Still, many small landlords think that the government – through the moratorium – has seized their properties as a way to provide housing for the indigent, a function they think is the responsibility of government, not individual private property owners.

“There seems to be this misconception that it is going to be OK because all this rent is going to get paid, and that is just not true,” Arena said. The problem, he says, is that many tenants who were out of work during the COVID-19 shutdown do not meet income guidelines for government assistance. And many small property owners who may rent out only one or even a few units do not have the capital reserves and financial wherewithal to ride out extended periods of not collecting rent.

“We have property owners who are on the brink of bankruptcy because they can’t pay their bills and they can’t afford this anymore,” Arena said.