During my past tenure as the president of the Idaho Self Storage Association I spoke with many owners and operators of self storage facilities about their thoughts on the twenty year old self storage lien law for Idaho. I found that many of them were not very familiar with the law or had no real opinion of it. Though there were some that felt the law could be improved to clarify the lien procedures.

Personally I feel the law could be improved upon on behalf of the self storage owner or operator. Unfortunately, most of the people that I spoke with didn’t feel it was too high of a priority to get involved in the process of changing the lien law.

One aspect of the Idaho lien law is the requirement to send a certified letter to the tenant in which a lien is being placed upon their storage unit. I have found that this is typically a futile attempt since a large percentage of the letters are returned unsigned. In addition the self storage operator must advertise the lien sale by publishing a public notice in the local newspaper. Both of these required procedures involve time and expenses from the self storage operator that is unnecessary.

This past year the Governors of Michigan and Arizona both signed an amendment to their lien laws that the lien notices may be delivered via First Class Mail instead of Certified Mail. And in Michigan it’s adequate to publish the lien sale on the storage company website. These improvements will save the operators money by replacing the requirement of Certified Mail and public notices.

I would encourage every operator and state self storage association to review their lien laws to see if they can be improved upon. There are a few attorneys that are experts in the field and they can assist you with the process if there are any questions or concerns. The National Self Storage Association is also available to support your efforts.