Most of DuPage County's property business runs through county buildings on County Farm Road in Wheaton. Here is how taxes, code enforcement and court cases are divided up there, and what selling as-is to a private buyer involves if that turns out to be the cleanest path.
Fair Value Investments is a private real-estate investor buying for our own account. We are not a broker, lender, attorney, or government agency, and we charge no fee to make an offer.
DuPage County's seat is Wheaton, and the offices a property owner is most likely to need sit close together there. The DuPage County Judicial Center, home of the 18th Judicial Circuit Court, is at 505 N. County Farm Road. The Treasurer, the County Clerk and the Recorder's Office are county offices in the same town. That makes DuPage one of the easier counties to navigate in person, as long as you know which desk owns which question.
The DuPage County Treasurer mails the bills, collects payments and, each year, conducts the tax sale for taxes that remain unpaid. The Treasurer's own explanation of that sale is plain: tax buyers bid on the interest rate the owner will be charged to pay the sold taxes back, and the buyer who accepts the lowest rate wins. The county is selling a lien for the taxes, not the property itself.
Before the sale, the county publishes a delinquent tax list in a newspaper. It includes owners' names, parcel numbers and amounts due, so a problem that felt private becomes public at that stage. Paying before the Treasurer's cutoff keeps a parcel off the sale; the Treasurer's page lists this year's dates.
After a sale, the conversation moves to the DuPage County Clerk, which calculates what it takes to redeem. One local quirk: DuPage calls the parcel number a Permanent Index Number, while Cook County calls it a Property Index Number. Both are abbreviated PIN, and the Clerk's redemption lookup asks for it. The Clerk's figures change as scheduled charges are added, so ask for a current number each time rather than relying on an old printout.
In DuPage, values are set first by township assessors and reviewed by the Supervisor of Assessments, with appeals to the county Board of Review. If you think a bill is built on the wrong value, the township assessor is usually the first call. An appeal can change what a future bill says. It is a different question from taxes that are already late.
DuPage is made up largely of incorporated cities and villages, from Naperville and Wheaton to Addison and Glendale Heights, and each enforces its own building and property maintenance rules through its own staff. Some towns also attach their own requirements to a sale, so the village or city hall is the place to ask what applies to a particular address.
Parcels outside municipal limits are handled by the county. The DuPage County Building & Zoning Department covers building permits for unincorporated areas.
Some towns reach across county lines. Naperville, for example, sits partly in DuPage and partly in Will County, so the county that taxes a Naperville house depends on which side of that line the parcel is on. The tax bill tells you which county it is.
A DuPage foreclosure is a civil case filed in the 18th Judicial Circuit Court and heard at the Judicial Center in Wheaton. The Clerk of the Circuit Court keeps the file, including the complaint, the summons and every order the judge enters. Illinois foreclosure is court-supervised from start to finish: a judge enters any judgment, and a judge must confirm any sale before it is final.
If you have been served, an attorney or a free HUD-approved housing counselor can explain the options that exist in your case and the dates that apply to it. Illinois Legal Aid Online has a plain-language overview of the process. The housing counselor line is in the notice at the bottom of this page.
The DuPage County Recorder's Office keeps the deeds, mortgages, releases and liens recorded against every parcel in the county. When a property sells, the title company reads those records to build the list of what must be paid off or released for the buyer to receive clear title, and records the new deed when the sale closes.
Selling to Fair Value Investments does not skip any of the county's steps; it simply removes repairs, showings and the wait for a buyer's financing. We look at the property, you get a cash offer, and you decide. If you go ahead, a title company handles the closing: it collects the payoff amounts, pays the mortgage, any delinquent or sold taxes and recorded liens from the sale proceeds, and sends the rest to you.
A DuPage house in good condition will often do well on the open market, and when listing would net you more, we will say so. Our pricing explainer walks through the comparison. Related pages: property tax trouble, missed mortgage payments and code violations.
The DuPage County Treasurer conducts the annual tax sale. Redemption after a sale is handled by the DuPage County Clerk.
Permanent Index Number. It is the same idea as Cook County's Property Index Number: the number every county office uses to find a parcel.
In the 18th Judicial Circuit Court at the DuPage County Judicial Center, 505 N. County Farm Road in Wheaton.
Yes. We look at DuPage properties as they stand, including ones with open code issues, deferred maintenance or damage.
No repairs, no fee, no obligation. See the number, then decide.