A woman in Chicago was left panicked when she received a letter saying her family home had been sold from under her due to a mix-up claiming she hadn’t paid her taxes.
Robin McElroy from the Morgan Park neighborhood was left distraught and confused when she was told her home had been sold.
McElroy had received letters claiming that she hadn’t been paying her property taxes, she said: ‘I just started receiving letters just from different tax buyers.’
However, McElroy had receipts from her property tax payments she had made since she bought her house in 2012, reported CBS News Chicago.
‘I do not like wasting money. I do not pay that “stupid tax.” I pay my bills,’ she told the outlet.
She had been told in April 2019 by the Treasurer’s Office that the PIN assignment on the Assessor’s website had been swapped with her neighbors.
Since McElroy had been paying her taxes correctly, she was relieved to be told that there were ‘no grounds to proceed with a sale’ of her property.
‘They actually told me, “Don’t worry about it”,’ she added.
McElroy, believing everything had been resolved, didn’t worry about it. That was until five years later when she received another letter.
‘I’m about to cry now,’ she told CBS.
A letter from Cook County Circuit Court was delivered to McElroy this year, it read: ‘This notice is to advise you that the above property has been sold.’
It detailed that her house had been ‘sold for delinquent taxes’ and McElroy even owed three years of rent to the owner who bought her house.
‘This lady should not have to be put in this position to go through all of this headache and heartache. This is stressful,’ McElroy said about the new owner.
According to CBS, the flagged internal issue with her PIN had never been resolved – resulting in her tax issues and the loss of her home.
‘Keep in mind that, you know, this is somebody’s property that they paid for; that they’re living in,’ McElroy added.
The Assessor’s Office acknowledged the issue with CBS and had now made the correction regarding the swapped PIN.
A spokesperson for the Assessor’s Office said it was working with its legal team to resolve the issue and all McElroy’s taxes had been paid.
McElroy said, however, she wanted everything in writing before she believes anything.
‘You guys can point fingers all day long. I don’t care. I want what’s rightfully owned to me,’ she said.
Now, McElroy has had to pay for her own lawyer to help herself clear up the mess. Court records give her until next week to file a response, and McElroy hopes it’ll be cleared up by then.