This year, the issue of abandoned records in self-storage has really come to the fore, as more and more businesses go bankrupt or lose solvency and fail to pay their rent. What do you do when you have a delinquent unit belonging to a company that stores records—records that often contain peoples' personal information such as name, address, phone number, date of birth, Social Security number? Think, for example, about a mortgage or finance company.

If you think back to March, you may remember a story that was in the news about a self-storage operator in Maine who attempted to auction off 60 boxes of financial records from a mortgage company. The Maine Bureau of Consumer Credit Protection got involved, and the issue became a legislative one. (You can read a past blog about the details of the case here: Self-Storage Legislation: Could Be Heartache on the Horizon.)

Since then, we've had a number of inquiries about the issue from self-storage operators nationwide, and other legislation has emerged. For example, a law was introduced in California in April to outline a course of action for the disposal of information. Read "New CA Bill Addresses Disposal of Abandoned Records" for details.

This week, the issue rears its ugly head yet again. Allstate Self Storage in North Phoenix announced it would auction off boxes containing 30,000 case files to recoup unpaid rent from the National Center for Missing Adults. Fellow storage operators were horrified that the facility would move forward. See what people are saying about it on Self-Storage Talk: "Missing-Persons Case Files to Be Auctioned Off."

Jump in and share your thoughts on this critical issue. Have you experienced a situation where you were stuck with personal records in a unit? How did you handle it? How do you think an operator in this situation should proceed? Sometimes a facility is owed thousands of dollars by the company that left the records. Does that excuse the exposure of innocent peoples' information, especially when that info could lead to identity theft?

If you want some more information about how to deal with abandoned records in self-storage, read these two informative articles written by industry legal expert Jeffrey Greenberger:

You can also purchase an audiovisual recording of our most recent Legal Learning Webinar, which focused on the issue: "Addressing Abandoned Records in Self-Storage: What We Can Learn From Maine."