The Illinois state eviction moratorium is no longer in place. Based on Governor Pritzker’s most recent executive order, Executive Order 2021-23 (issued on September 17, 2021), the moratorium on law enforcement carrying out eviction orders against certain covered persons was in place through October 3, 2021, after which it was rescinded. This state moratorium remained in place despite the Supreme Court decision lifting the CDC national eviction moratorium on August 26, 2021. Read the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s statement on the Supreme Court decision here »
Tens of thousands of families and individuals face eviction in Illinois each year. 56,948 eviction cases were filed against Illinois tenants in 2016, and 46% of those case resulted in evictions.
This means at least 72 Illinoisans and their families lose their homes every day.
Being evicted can kick off or deepen a spiral of financial instability. It can affect a person’s ability to get or keep a job, care for family, stay in good health, build or maintain relationships, and secure future housing. Just having an eviction filing on the public record can also be a serious obstacle in securing future housing. The consequences of eviction are both immediate and long term, and they spread into all aspects of individual, family, and community life. An increase in a community’s economic instability is correlated with higher crime rates and higher healthcare and social service costs. The issue of eviction affects everyone in a community.
Although eviction is by no means a new problem, the publication in 2016 of Matthew Desmond’s heartbreaking, Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, has sparked widespread interest in this issue. Desmond’s profiles of eight families struggling to keep their homes in Milwaukee, which he contextualizes with a wealth of data, illustrate two important conclusions:
People are primarily evicted because of poverty. Not paying rent is the result of not having adequate income.
Evictions are not just the result of poverty; they are a cause of poverty. Experiencing an eviction can lead to a cycle of financial insecurity, job loss, family instability, and homelessness.
Eviction is prevalent throughout Illinois. Among Illinois’s eight cities with populations of more than 100,000 residents, the cities with the highest eviction rate are Rockford, Joliet and Peoria. Eviction is also prevalent in small and mid-size cities, as well as in suburban and rural areas. Approximately two-thirds of evictions cases are brought outside of Cook County, even though the majority of renters in Illinois live in Cook County.