How to find concealed eviction records

[Patrick Pan]

Hello everyone,

I recently evicted a tenant and had to concede to the demand to conceal this eviction record during the negotiation. It's not fair for his future landlords not to know about this terrible tenant. Anyhow this makes me afraid of accepting someone who got their eviction record concealed. I've heard that in California, the eviction record is automatically concealed for 30 days (yuck!). I wonder how long it's concealed in Illinois.

How to find the prospect concealed eviction records in Cook county? Does physically going to downtown reveal more info than the Cook County Circuit court website?

Thanks,

Patrick

[Ruth Bayang]

Wow. I've never heard of that till now!
That would give me pause before buying rentals in CA or IL.

I will be following this with great interest.

[Corey D. McCray]

Not sure you can discover a Concealed Eviction as this is the first I've heard of it.  However what my client's look for is any eviction action.  If a tenant has a recent eviction action then it is safe to assume they are not a responsible tenant.

[David Tipton]

"I've heard that in California, the eviction record is automatically concealed for 30 days (yuck!)"

It's actually 60 days, win or lose.  If the tenant prevails, the record is sealed permanently.  

[Heidi Pliam]

 @Patrick Pan not all states take such measures, and you can ask a reputable tenant screening company in your area how that works.  In Minneapolis the tenant has to take the initiative to make an eviction disappear, and it's not always easy.  The law here says eviction is a public interest issue (of course it is!!!) So even if the landlord approves an expungement (deletion), the judge is not supposed to delete it unless the eviction was not legitimate at the time it was filed.  So when I'm reviewing screening reports for my rentals, I like to find out the story behind an eviction - I've had good tenants with evictions on their records who never bothered to expunge their eviction from the record when they had a prior vindictive landlord (yes, such landlords do exist and give the rest of us a bad name). 

Good Luck!
Heidi

[Patrick Pan]

Thank you everyone for sharing your opinions.

[Madeline Burke]

Yuck indeed! I run the check anyway but with a grain of salt. 

[Kimberly H.]

@Patrick Pan Why did you have to concede to that demand?

[Karen F.]

Our online court records in CT are now automatically dropping tenants' evictions fro the record after 3 yrs, or even less.  It sucks for us LLs, because if the tenant is poor, LL won't go to small claims to get award, too, and then there's eventually no record.

[Karen F.]

What we really need is a single internet "bad tenant" list to warn each other.

[Daniel Stanziale]

Not sure if that is legal but I agree. If a cash for  keys is given then how does the next landlord know if they are getting a bad tenant.  Or if it falls off After 3 yrs