Risk Management Blog

Effective in Illinois on January 1, 2018, the State Tax Lien Registration Act will change how state tax liens are filed there. It will create one centralized State Tax Lien Registry for filing notices of tax liens in favor of or enforced by the Illinois Department of Revenue, who will manage the new registry.

Currently, state tax liens in Illinois are filed by the Illinois Department of Revenue for unpaid taxes at appropriate county recorder offices across the state. The liens attach to both real and personal property and, once filed, remain perfected and attached to present and future debtor property until paid and released. After January 1^st, the new State Tax Lien Registration Act will require all state tax liens to be filed in the new State Tax Lien Registry, and all existing state tax lien filings will be moved and made available in this statewide centralized index.

Now what? Where do you look to assure you find ALL effective Illinois state tax liens?

That’s a good question right now. While the intention of the act is to centralize all state tax lien filings and remove the county recorders across the state from that equation, in practice and implementation things might not be so clear. The immediate and ongoing concern is:  have all effective state tax liens been successfully captured from every county recorder office across the state and then been successfully indexed for searching in the new centralized registry?

Until those concerns are resolved and there is confirmation that all state tax liens have been entered into the new centralized registry, anyone requiring state tax lien information in Illinois may need to consider due diligence that includes searching BOTH the new State Tax Lien Registry and the appropriate county recorder office to assure all effective state tax liens are discovered.

Do you need to search for state tax liens in Illinois to inform your important funding decisions? First Corporate Solutions can help. Contact us today and speak with one of our experts and assure your due diligence uncovers all effective Illinois state tax liens.