As I mentioned in a post just a few weeks back, Illinois landlords will have one more disclosure to provide to their tenants beginning in 2012. Governor Quinn recently signed into law certain amendments to the Illinois Radon Awareness Act that impose new disclosure requirements on landlords.
All landlords will have to disclose to tenants the existence of a radon hazards. The disclosure requirement applies to dwelling units (ie. room or rooms used for human habitation) located below the third story above ground level (I think that is a fancy way of saying the first two floors.. or maybe even the first two and a half floors).
If a Tenant provides the Landlord with notice that a radon test has indicated radon hazards, the Landlord will be required to disclose that to future renters. The law also gives the Landlord the option of conducting his own radon test and, if that test shows that radon does not exist, the Landlord is not obligated to disclose that there is a known radon hazard.
If the Landlord conducts a radon test and radon gas is found to be at hazardous levels, then the Landlord must make a written disclosure to the current Tenant as well as any future Tenants or Prospective Tenants.
The law goes on to provide that a Landlord who undertakes radon mitigation and obtains a radon test with results showing no radon hazards is not required to provide the radon disclosure.
I am personally skeptical of that final point. So the installation of a radon mitigation system alleviates the need to disclose? I intend to advise my landlord clients to provide the disclosure in all circumstances – even if radon mitigation work has been done. Truthful over-disclosure cannot hurt.
Well, beginning on January 1, 2012, Illinois Landlords will have one additional disclosure to add to the pile of paperwork they need to give to their tenants. Be prepared folks.
So in other words,the landlord is not required to provide a mitigation system, so what the point in having the law.
There is a certain segment of the population that believes that requiring disclosure and getting people informed has a value. Are they right? Time will tell.