Renters abandoned property & all belongings 6wks ago- refuse to answer phone - have made no attempts to obtain belongings - had even left live animals in the house uncared for in the middle of the summer - have not paid rent - left the area - accepted a certified letter which outlined disposal of belonging after a given date - made o attempt to pay money owed or obtain belongings - can I legally sell the belongings to recoup my monies they owe

From this site:
Illinois Uniform Residential Landlord Tenant Act Law - Residential Landlord and Tenant - Landlord Tenant

Rules regarding abandonment of premises.

Abandonment is typically defined as absence of the tenant from the premises for a period when rent has not been paid. Provided the statutory definition is met, a Landlord is allowed to repossess the premises and store tenant’s belongings. A Tenant may recover same before the expiration of a certain time, but must reimburse landlord for the cost of storage.

This site also has the actual code:
http://www.leestreet.com/lease/CIVIL%20PROCEDURE.php

You need to follow the process but then you can sell the property. Have you sent a pay or quit notice?

Do you have a written application/lease with these tenants? Have you tried calling an emergency contact?

Scott provided you with great links. Also, for future reference, if you're not a member of your local apartment association I would highly recommend it. It will give you access to use their lease which very carefully and specifically outlines all of these types of issues, and you'd have the support of your local association in walking through the steps. Actually, I'd look them up and call them about this. They can provide you with very useful information about how to proceed.

Just from a practical standpoint... As you proceed, VERY carefully and thoroughly document everything. That's kind of why I was asking if you'd tried contacting an emergency contact. If they ever were to come back looking for their stuff and wound up suing you, the more you can show what you tried to do, the stronger your case will be. You might even make a video, walking through the unit showing what all they left behind. There's a landlord in our local apt assn who recently went through a similar situation and after months the tenant came back claiming all kinds of stuff they'd left that never was in the unit.