.jpg)
1 month ago
4 Mauricio Umansky is being sued for allegedly pocketing more than $3.5 million in phony loans taken out as part of the COVID-19 pandemic’s federal relief offers. And for Mau, the financial hits just keep on coming!
On Thursday, a company called Realtor LLC filed a lawsuit against Umansky and his firm, The Agency. In that suit, per docs seen by Us Weekly, Realtor LLC accuses the 54-year-old real estate mogul and the company he founded of fraudulently applying for and receiving $3,521,153.00 in loans via the government’s Payroll Protection Program and its associated CARES Act, which were enacted at the height of the COVID pandemic.
As you probably remember, those PPP loans were put in place to allow for businesses to continue to pay their employees even through pandemic-related shutdowns. This was meant for small businesses, but a lot of very rich folks took advantage. And per the lawsuit, Umansky’s Buying Beverly Hills-focused firm supposedly went way past what was legal! The suit claims that the loan amount The Agency and its CEO “applied for and received exceeded the loan limit of 2.5 monthly salary with a cap of $100,000 annual salary per employee.” So… what did he use the rest of the money for?? Realtor LLC goes even further, too, alleging Umansky’s company “falsely” filled out documents mis-claiming how much loan money they needed to pay employees. Damn.
Related: How Kyle Richards REALLY Felt Seeing Pics Of Mau With A Younger Woman!
The suit also argues Kye Richards‘ estranged hubby’s firm would have been “minimally” impacted by pandemic shutdowns since it wasn’t a brick-and-mortar storefront selling products. Instead, the real estate biz thrived on high-dollar transactions “typically between millionaires and billionaires.” And those transactions went on as before, no matter the pandemic! So they didn’t need PPR loans at all?? NOPE! Because Realtor LLC also pointed out that Umansky’s biz absolutely blew up during the pandemic. Noting that The Agency earned a whopping $6.5 billion in 2020, and an even more impressive $11.2 billion in 2021, the suit stated:
“With this knowledge, Defendants would have retained significant reserves to continue to pay their employees. To do otherwise would have been grossly irresponsible, especially for experts in the real estate markets. As alleged above, Defendants expressly did not hold themselves out as grossly irresponsible and their experience and success confirms they were not.”
Wow!!
Now, the lawsuit is demanding that Umansky’s biz pay back THREE TIMES the loan amount — so, more than $10 million. Ouch! Umansky himself hasn’t responded to the allegations, but a rep for The Agency did release this statement to Us which vigorously defended the company against the claims:
“While we are unable to comment on ongoing litigation, we want to emphasize that The Agency has always operated with the highest level of integrity in all aspects of our business. Like many companies, we faced significant challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic, including layoffs and cutbacks. Our focus has always been, and especially during that challenging period, on delivering exceptional service to our customers and supporting our employees. The claims in this case do not reflect the reality of our operations and financial situation at the time we filed for our PPP loans, and we intend to vigorously defend against these meritless claims.”
Reactions, y’all?? Share ’em (below)…
[Image via Netflix/YouTube]
