## Facts

- A developer recorded restrictive covenants for a residential subdivision providing that each lot could be used only for residential purposes and only for “one detached single family dwelling” and a limited private garage.
- The covenants were to run for 25 years and then automatically renew in 10-year periods unless a majority of lot owners recorded an agreed change.
- Over time, land outside the subdivision became more commercial, including highway expansion, construction of a nearby tollway, and development of a hotel near the subdivision’s edge.
- Three corner lots within the subdivision remained vacant and were owned by the original developer through a land trust.
- The developer obtained city rezoning to allow multi-family use on those lots and proposed building a duplex apartment building.
- Other subdivision lot owners sued to enjoin the duplex as a violation of the recorded covenant.

## Issues

1. Whether surrounding commercial development and related changes constituted such changed conditions that the single-family restrictive covenant was no longer enforceable against the subject lots.
2. Whether enforcement should be denied on a relative-hardship theory because compliance allegedly made the lots difficult to sell for single-family use.
3. Whether a developer who imposed the covenants could avoid them based on later development choices and external commercial encroachments.

## Decision

- The appellate court affirmed the permanent injunction barring construction of a duplex on the lots during the covenant’s term.
- The court held that surrounding changes did not defeat the covenant’s purpose where the subdivision itself remained substantially residential and the restriction continued to benefit lot owners.
- The court rejected a hardship-based refusal to enforce a clear, recorded restriction benefiting other owners.
- The court upheld exclusion of collateral evidence about plaintiffs that did not bear on enforceability of the single-family restriction.

## Legal Principles

- Changed-conditions defenses to enforcement of subdivision restrictions focus primarily on whether conditions within the restricted area have changed so substantially that the covenant’s purpose can no longer be accomplished; external neighborhood changes alone are usually insufficient.
- Recorded covenants imposed as part of a common residential scheme remain enforceable where they continue to confer real and substantial benefits and are not shown to be waived, abandoned, or defeated by estoppel.
- Equity generally will not relieve a covenant-burdened owner from compliance merely because enforcement is less profitable or causes hardship, especially where other owners purchased in reliance on the restriction.
- A party may not rely on changed conditions materially caused by that party’s own conduct to avoid a restriction that the party created and recorded.

## Conclusion

The court enforced the subdivision’s single-family restrictive covenant and affirmed injunctive relief, holding that surrounding commercial development and claimed hardship did not justify permitting a duplex where the residential scheme within the subdivision remained intact and beneficial to other lot owners.


Cordogan v. Union Nat’l Bank of Elgin, 64 Ill. App. 3d 248, 380 N.E.2d 1194 (Ill. App. Ct. 1978)