Real estate taxes are paid in two installments each year. The second, final installment of Cook County 1995 real estate taxes was due September 11, 1996. We hope everyone has paid those taxes by now. If you paid close to the due date, you should check with the Cook County treasurer (312/443-5100) to determine when your payment was applied. If it was applied after September 11 you will owe interest for the day(s) in between. Failure to pay this interest may put your property on the delinquent tax list and create an opportunity for someone to buy your property for the amount of the real estate tax due.

Cook County property owners have the option of paying their real estate taxes under protest and then filing rate protest litigation. This will result in a small refund approximately nine years after the protest. Prior to this year, if a taxpayer wanted to pay taxes under protest, the second installment check had to be accompanied by a protest document indicating the percentage of taxes that were being protested. Until 1996, we asked clients to send tax bills along with checks payable to the County Collector to our office so that we could pay these taxes under protest for you by preparing written protest documents and hand delivering checks to the County Treasurer with these documents. In 1995, the state statute regarding paying under protest was amended. The new law states that if taxpayers want to object to their taxes for any reason (other than property being exempt from taxation), they must pay all taxes due (both installments) for that particular year plus any interest due within 60 days from the due date of the final installment. For the 1995 tax year, that means within 60 days of September 11, 1996. If you pay all taxes in compliance with this procedure and our firm files rate protest litigation in Circuit Court, taxes are deemed to have been paid under protest. A separate wriKen protest letter is no longer required to be filed with the County Collector (County Treasurer). Consequently, it is no longer necessary to transmit your tax bills and checks to our of fice for payment. Tax payments can now be made by you directly to the County Treasurer's office. If nothing more is done, however, paying taxes under protest is a useless act. It must be followed by filing rate protest litigation. This litigation will fail for any parcel that was not paid under protest.

"Tax objections" are lawsuits filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County. They differ from rate protest litigation discussed on the previous page, which is also filed in the Circuit Court. Tax objections are undertaken when we believe there is still an additional argument for reducing the assessment of a property beyond what was granted by the Assessor and Board of Appeals. These suits currently take five years to get to trial. If we determine that a tax objection should be filed to contest the 1995 real estate assessment on your property, we will obtatn copies of proof of payment of your taxes from the County Collector's office.

This bulletin provides readers with information on general issues, and not substantive legal advice or legal opinion on any specific facts or circumstances. If you have any questions about this Bulletin please contact Christopher Cohen at 312/726-9700 or Larry Brodsky at 312/807-4638.