Thursday, July 31, 2008

Concerns Over Integrity Of Mortgage Industry’s Foreclosure Eviction Practices Of Tenants Alarm Cook County Sheriff’s Office

In Cook County, Illinois, The Chicago Reporter reports:
  • In many cases, the [tenant foreclosure] evictions have been legal. In others they’re not because mortgagees—a bank or company that collects mortgage payments— fail to give tenants ample notice or an opportunity to contest the eviction in court. In some cases, [...] the evictions are illegal because there is no court order against the tenants themselves.

  • In Cook County, tenants facing an illegal eviction often learn about it when they open their door to a sheriff’s deputy telling them to leave. Sometimes, [...] the deputies’ orders instruct them to evict the landlord, not the tenant. If tenants are home and can verify their identity, the deputies leave and report back to the lender.

  • Problems arise when tenants aren’t home, said Martha DiCaro, an assistant chief who runs the Eviction, Levy and Warrant Unit of the Cook County Sheriff’s Office. “We are under the impression that the person whose name is on the order is the person who lives there,” DiCaro said. “We take the court’s order at face value and we enforce it.”

  • Concerns over the integrity of the mortgage industry’s eviction practices have alarmed the sheriff’s office.

For more, see A Renter's Nightmare.

For other posts involving the problems tenants face in rented homes in foreclosure, go here, go here, go here, go here, go here, go here, and go here. TenantRentSkimmingAlpha