Owner and Agent do not warrant legality of Unit?

[Sebastien Beauboeuf]

Hello everyone,

In the section where the seller's agent write a description of the property, often times i see something like "Owner and Agent do not warrant legality of Unit." I'm not completely sure what that means. Let's say the property is advertised as a 3 unit with one of the units being a basement/garden/attic unit. I'm guessing because of new zoning laws, these units don't comply but are grandfathered in because they were already like that before the zoning change. So are they legal or not legal? I read somewhere that the owner doesn't get penalized if the "legal/illegal" unit stays occupied and you can continue renting them out, and that they lose the rental privilege if they're vacant for more than a certain amount of days. Then you can't rent them anymore and are forced to remove the kitchens and stuff. Can anyone give me some clarification on that? I appreciate the help.

I'm in Chicago, IL btw so anything specific to here would be even better.

[Russell Brazil]

@Brie Schmidt might have some insite as she sells a bunch of multis in Chicago.