Legislation shields taxpayers who make honest mistakes. Pappas praises new homeowner protection law.
Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas on Monday praised the signing of legislation introduced by State Rep. Julie Hamos (D-Evanston) to help prevent homeowners from losing their properties if they make the mistake of paying taxes on the wrong property.
People make honest mistakes, and this is an important step to remove the punishment of those who make honest mistakes, Pappas said. Prior to this, a taxpayer who made payments in good faith on another property would find out years later that their own taxes were delinquent and were sold. By that time, there might have been liens with interest and penalties that cost thousands of dollars to remove, a sometimes difficult debt for the taxpayer to overcome.
Hamos said she hopes the change in the real-estate tax code will add some compassion to the law by allowing the courts to set aside tax sales where taxpayers made timely and complete payments of what they reasonably believed was due.
Such mistakes occur when homeowners obtain the tax bill for the wrong permanent real estate index number and begin paying somebody elses property taxes, leaving their own taxes delinquent and vulnerable to sale.
In Cook County, real estate tax bills warn property owners to verify the index numbers with their deeds, but those who overlook this advice or obtain an incorrect number from a mortgage company, clerk, or other source might wind up with the wrong tax bill.
The gravity of the issue was demonstrated by the case of an Evanston homeowner who discovered belatedly that she had paid for years on a neighbors property taxes after receiving the wrong index number. It was only after the source of the mistake was found that the Treasurers Office and the Cook County States Attorneys Office were able to petition the court to declare the tax sale in error. In most cases with very similar situations, the law provided the Treasurers Office with no room to seek a declaration of a sale in error.