Illinois Landlord Retaliation Act 2025: Bad-Faith Presumption

Public Act 103-0831, originating as House Bill 4768, created the Landlord Retaliation Act at 765 ILCS 721 and repealed the prior Retaliatory Eviction Act at 765 ILCS 720. The new Act isn't a minor rewording of the old one. It expands the list of protected tenant activities, adds a codified rebuttable presumption tied to a specific time window, and increases the damages a tenant can recover.

[Cite: Illinois Public Act 103-0831 (HB 4768); 765 ILCS 721]

A landlord who was already familiar with the old Retaliatory Eviction Act shouldn't assume that law still governs. The repeal is complete, and the new Act's broader scope means conduct that wasn't clearly covered before may be covered now.

The Act protects a tenant who, in good faith, reports code violations to a government agency, elected representative, or public official; complains to or seeks help from a community organization or the news media about code violations or illegal practices; requests repairs required by code or the lease; organizes or joins a tenants' union or similar organization; testifies in a court or administrative proceeding about the condition of the premises; or exercises any other right or remedy provided by law.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/5]

That last category, exercising any right or remedy provided by law, is written broadly enough to sweep in conduct beyond the six specific examples listed alongside it. A tenant invoking a statutory protection this article hasn't named, a habitability claim, a fair-housing complaint, a withholding-of-rent remedy tied to a code violation, likely falls within that catch-all provision as well.

This is the single biggest practical shift from the old law. If a landlord's adverse action against a tenant comes within one year of that tenant's protected activity, the Act presumes the action was retaliatory.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/20]

That's a genuine burden shift, not a factor a court simply weighs alongside everything else. Once a tenant establishes the timing, a presumption of retaliation exists automatically, and it's the landlord's job to overcome it, rather than the tenant's job to affirmatively prove retaliatory intent from scratch.

The Act's remedies section is written around adverse actions broadly, and the categories that trigger the presumption and give rise to a claim include raising rent, refusing to renew a lease, terminating a tenancy, and filing or threatening an eviction.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/10]

A landlord evaluating whether a planned action might trigger this presumption should look at the full range of adverse actions, not just eviction. A rent increase timed close to a tenant's repair request or code complaint carries the same presumption risk as an eviction filed under the same circumstances.

The presumption isn't automatically fatal to a landlord's case. It can be rebutted in one of two ways: by showing a legitimate, non-retaliatory reason for the action, or by showing the action was already underway before the tenant engaged in the protected activity.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/15]

The second path is the more concrete one to document in advance. A landlord who can show a rent increase was already planned and communicated to other tenants in the building before a specific tenant's complaint, or that a non-renewal decision was already in motion for reasons unrelated to the complaint, has a defense grounded in timing and paper trail rather than in after-the-fact justification.

The first defense path, a legitimate non-retaliatory reason, puts the burden on the landlord to articulate and support that reason once the presumption applies. Reported guidance on this Act consistently emphasizes documentation: lease violations, non-payment, property damage, or other grounds unrelated to the tenant's protected activity, backed by records created at or near the time of the underlying conduct.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/15; independent compliance analyses of Public Act 103-0831]

A landlord who waits until a dispute arises to reconstruct a justification is in a materially weaker position than one who has contemporaneous records, maintenance logs, payment history, prior written notices, showing the adverse action tracks a genuine, independent reason.

A tenant who successfully proves retaliation, or who benefits from the unrebutted presumption, can recover lease termination along with full return of the security deposit and any prepaid rent, recovery of possession if the tenant was dispossessed or threatened with dispossession, and damages equal to the greater of 2 months' rent or 2 times the tenant's actual damages, plus reasonable attorney's fees.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/10]

That "greater of" structure functions as a damages floor. Even a tenant who can't prove significant actual financial harm is still entitled to 2 months' rent as a baseline recovery, which means the exposure for a landlord who loses a retaliation claim isn't tied only to demonstrable losses.

Beyond the damages figure itself, the Act allows a prevailing tenant to recover reasonable attorney's fees.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/10]

That fee-shifting provision matters for how these claims actually get litigated. A tenant with a strong presumption-backed claim has a more realistic path to finding legal representation, since attorney's fees aren't coming out of the tenant's own damages award. For a landlord, that changes the calculus around settling a disputed claim early versus litigating it through to a final judgment.

Because filing or threatening an eviction is itself one of the adverse actions this Act covers, a landlord pursuing eviction against a tenant who engaged in protected activity within the prior year should expect the tenant to be able to raise retaliation as a defense within that same eviction case.

[Cite: 765 ILCS 721/10; 765 ILCS 5/9-106.4]

That defense doesn't require the tenant to file a separate lawsuit. It can surface directly inside the eviction proceeding itself, which means a landlord's litigation strategy for the underlying eviction has to account for the retaliation question from the outset, not treat it as a separate, later concern.

The practical starting point is building a documentation habit around every rent increase, non-renewal, lease termination, and eviction filing: a dated, written record of the actual reason, created at the time of the decision rather than reconstructed afterward. Cross-checking that decision against whether the affected tenant has engaged in any of the seven protected activities within the prior twelve months is the second step, since that's the exact window the presumption uses.

Training leasing and property management staff to flag any adverse action involving a tenant who has recently complained, requested repairs, or raised a code issue, so that decision gets a documented, independently justified reason before it moves forward, reduces exposure under a law that now puts the burden of proof on the landlord rather than the tenant.