5 ms·

Well this could be a fun data science project. How much real estate fraud can you find in ACRIS?

by iaw 8y ago

mikeyouse 8y ago
Fun story; when the financial disclosures came out for the new administration, I wrote a quick script to compare Trump's LLCs to property records in NYC's ACRIS and then looked over the results by hand to see outliers. It took literally 30 minutes of my time and I found the Trumps trying to evade like $500k in taxes. Eric Trump had used two anonymous LLCs to buy properties from his father's LLC for far below market rate. He was going to combine the units with another he already owned which actually made them more valuable than simple comps suggested. There were several opportunities to disclose the related party / family transaction but they both affirmed that it was at arm's length in the paperwork that they signed. Propublica & The WaPo both published articles but I wasn't sure at the time so I remained anonymous publicly. Turns out that corruption doesn't matter and nobody cares that our president constantly commits financial crimes, so meh? The propublica article: https://www.propublica.org/article/heres-how-trump-transferred-wealth-to-his-son-while-avoiding-usual-taxes https://www.propublica.org/article/heres-how-trump-transferr...
- intended 8y ago
  No, people care - but they are usually busy dealing with other news they are currently being overwhelmed by.
  - mikeyouse 8y ago
    It’s just amusing that if I had found something similar about the president 3 years ago instead of 1 year ago, it would’ve been front page news and would’ve likely resulted in impeachment hearings. Instead.. crickets and a couple lightly read articles. I always regarded moral relativism as a lens to judge modern culture against historical cultures and norms. It turns out that it’s much, much worse to be a ‘good’ person committing a moderately bad act as compared to a ‘bad’ person who regularly commits much worse acts. That’s a bit depressing. Edit to clarify my point: It was a major scandal when Tim Geithner had to pay $20k in back taxes that he owed from his time at the IMF, similarly when one of Clinton’s nominees for the AJ position withdrew when it turned out that she owed taxes on the salary she was paying her housekeeper, similarly again Spiro Agnew resigned from the office of the Vice President of the US over something like $8k in taxes on income he didn’t report (as well as some other corruption involving bribes and kickbacks). But millions of dollars of illegally shielded income depriving the treasury of hundreds of thousands of dollars in tax revenue during the campaign merits a shrug because there are so many other scandals.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - lotsofpulp 8y ago
      Trump’s voter base would champion those actions, it’s not like it’s unknown that he’s a scumbag developer that takes every effort to cheat everyone he deals with. But the important thing is that they believe he’s on their team or one of their tribe, which allows him a lot of leeway in his behavior compared to someone on the other team or tribe, for whom even a minor indiscretion is unacceptable. Similar mechanisms are at work when a popular athlete is caught doing something, or priests, etc. Once someone’s ego becomes invested in you, you can more easily take advantage of them and that’s an important thing to learn (and wield for yourself).
  - emodendroket 8y ago
    If this is not the point of the constant stream of outrageous tweets, it's at least a side effect that's quite beneficial to Trump.
- joering2 8y ago
  Man is a genius at scams like this one! Google “Trump empty jewlery box” ;)
- refurb 8y ago
  Is it fraud to sell property below it’s market price? Honest question. I had a family member sell me property for $1 (it was a gift). That alone isn’t fraud. And in terms of taxes, usually far below market prices and taxed at an appraised value so the govt still gets their dollars.
  - Miner49er 8y ago
    I'm not a lawyer, an accountant, or in any way a tax expert, but I'm pretty sure in the U.S. your family member would have to pay a gift tax for "fair market value" of the property. But they only have to pay this tax if they gifted more then 5.43 million in their lifetime. However, if the house is worth more then $14k they had to report it. If they did that it's not fraud, if they didn't it is, I think. Here's more info: https://www.elderlawanswers.com/giving-your-home-to-your-children-can-have-tax-consequences-9667 https://www.elderlawanswers.com/giving-your-home-to-your-chi...
    - mikeyouse 8y ago
      Yep, this is the correct answer. It's fine to sell a stranger a house for $1. It's considered a gift subject to the gift tax (if you've exceeded the lifetime limit or expect to pay estate taxes) to sell a family member or a "related party" the same property for the same price. Trump is obviously going to bequeath his children more than the estate tax limit ($11m now, the $5m was pre tax reform) and yeah it should have been reported. The property appraises at the same price so property taxes aren't the concern, just income taxes due on the transfer.
      - ensignavenger 8y ago
        So did you hire an appraiser to appraise the property and confirm that it was worth ore than it sold for?
        mikeyouse 8y ago
        Lol. Come on.. If you read the article, the two properties were listed for sale for $245,000 and $250,000 in 1997. They are two luxury condos, literally on Central Park, in a doorman building in NYC. They were previously listed at $800k (without the ability of a unrelated party to combine them with Eric's other unit in the building). A similar unit sold for $700k in 2014. What do you think the Fair Market Value of those condos is? More or less than the $350k that Trump sold them for? Do you think the annual real estate inflation rate in Manhattan from 1997 to 2016 is more or less than the 1.7% implied by the sale price? Several different tax lawyers weighed in for the ProPublica piece listed above, and as well as the Washington Post piece here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/this-trump-real-estate-deal-looks-awfully-like-criminal-tax-fraud/2017/08/03/653055fe-786e-11e7-8839-ec48ec4cae25_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/this-trump-real-estat... And Newsweek's treatment of the sales when it turned out Eric had applied for a permit to combine the three units to turn them into a multi-level penthouse on Central Park: https://www.newsweek.com/eric-trump-making-penthouse-real-estate-deal-dad-during-trump-campaign-782451 https://www.newsweek.com/eric-trump-making-penthouse-real-es... Would you honestly be surprised if Trump was engaging in low-grade real estate tax fraud to benefit his family?
_bxg1 8y ago
Assuming the documents are digitized, would probably be pretty easy to put together a neural network that pegs "interesting" documents for review. Not that it should be used as an authoritative judgement, but it sounds like so much stuff gets through the system just because there aren't enough eyes to check everything for the obvious markers.

Well this could be a fun data science project. How much real estate fraud can you find in ACRIS?

by iaw 8y ago

Well this could be a fun data science project. How much real estate fraud can you find in ACRIS?

Fun story; when the financial disclosures came out for the new administration, I wrote a quick script to compare Trump's LLCs to property records in NYC's ACRIS and then looked over the results by hand to see outliers. It took literally 30 minutes of my time and I found the Trumps trying to evade like $500k in taxes. Eric Trump had used two anonymous LLCs to buy properties from his father's LLC for far below market rate. He was going to combine the units with another he already owned which actually made them more valuable than simple comps suggested. There were several opportunities to disclose the related party / family transaction but they both affirmed that it was at arm's length in the paperwork that they signed. Propublica & The WaPo both published articles but I wasn't sure at the time so I remained anonymous publicly. Turns out that corruption doesn't matter and nobody cares that our president constantly commits financial crimes, so meh? The propublica article: https://www.propublica.org/article/heres-how-trump-transferred-wealth-to-his-son-while-avoiding-usual-taxes https://www.propublica.org/article/heres-how-trump-transferr...

intended 8y ago
No, people care - but they are usually busy dealing with other news they are currently being overwhelmed by.
- mikeyouse 8y ago
  It’s just amusing that if I had found something similar about the president 3 years ago instead of 1 year ago, it would’ve been front page news and would’ve likely resulted in impeachment hearings. Instead.. crickets and a couple lightly read articles. I always regarded moral relativism as a lens to judge modern culture against historical cultures and norms. It turns out that it’s much, much worse to be a ‘good’ person committing a moderately bad act as compared to a ‘bad’ person who regularly commits much worse acts. That’s a bit depressing. Edit to clarify my point: It was a major scandal when Tim Geithner had to pay $20k in back taxes that he owed from his time at the IMF, similarly when one of Clinton’s nominees for the AJ position withdrew when it turned out that she owed taxes on the salary she was paying her housekeeper, similarly again Spiro Agnew resigned from the office of the Vice President of the US over something like $8k in taxes on income he didn’t report (as well as some other corruption involving bribes and kickbacks). But millions of dollars of illegally shielded income depriving the treasury of hundreds of thousands of dollars in tax revenue during the campaign merits a shrug because there are so many other scandals.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - lotsofpulp 8y ago
    Trump’s voter base would champion those actions, it’s not like it’s unknown that he’s a scumbag developer that takes every effort to cheat everyone he deals with. But the important thing is that they believe he’s on their team or one of their tribe, which allows him a lot of leeway in his behavior compared to someone on the other team or tribe, for whom even a minor indiscretion is unacceptable. Similar mechanisms are at work when a popular athlete is caught doing something, or priests, etc. Once someone’s ego becomes invested in you, you can more easily take advantage of them and that’s an important thing to learn (and wield for yourself).
- emodendroket 8y ago
  If this is not the point of the constant stream of outrageous tweets, it's at least a side effect that's quite beneficial to Trump.
joering2 8y ago
Man is a genius at scams like this one! Google “Trump empty jewlery box” ;)
refurb 8y ago
Is it fraud to sell property below it’s market price? Honest question. I had a family member sell me property for $1 (it was a gift). That alone isn’t fraud. And in terms of taxes, usually far below market prices and taxed at an appraised value so the govt still gets their dollars.
- Miner49er 8y ago
  I'm not a lawyer, an accountant, or in any way a tax expert, but I'm pretty sure in the U.S. your family member would have to pay a gift tax for "fair market value" of the property. But they only have to pay this tax if they gifted more then 5.43 million in their lifetime. However, if the house is worth more then $14k they had to report it. If they did that it's not fraud, if they didn't it is, I think. Here's more info: https://www.elderlawanswers.com/giving-your-home-to-your-children-can-have-tax-consequences-9667 https://www.elderlawanswers.com/giving-your-home-to-your-chi...
  - mikeyouse 8y ago
    Yep, this is the correct answer. It's fine to sell a stranger a house for $1. It's considered a gift subject to the gift tax (if you've exceeded the lifetime limit or expect to pay estate taxes) to sell a family member or a "related party" the same property for the same price. Trump is obviously going to bequeath his children more than the estate tax limit ($11m now, the $5m was pre tax reform) and yeah it should have been reported. The property appraises at the same price so property taxes aren't the concern, just income taxes due on the transfer.
    - ensignavenger 8y ago
      So did you hire an appraiser to appraise the property and confirm that it was worth ore than it sold for?
      - mikeyouse 8y ago
        Lol. Come on.. If you read the article, the two properties were listed for sale for $245,000 and $250,000 in 1997. They are two luxury condos, literally on Central Park, in a doorman building in NYC. They were previously listed at $800k (without the ability of a unrelated party to combine them with Eric's other unit in the building). A similar unit sold for $700k in 2014. What do you think the Fair Market Value of those condos is? More or less than the $350k that Trump sold them for? Do you think the annual real estate inflation rate in Manhattan from 1997 to 2016 is more or less than the 1.7% implied by the sale price? Several different tax lawyers weighed in for the ProPublica piece listed above, and as well as the Washington Post piece here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/this-trump-real-estate-deal-looks-awfully-like-criminal-tax-fraud/2017/08/03/653055fe-786e-11e7-8839-ec48ec4cae25_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/this-trump-real-estat... And Newsweek's treatment of the sales when it turned out Eric had applied for a permit to combine the three units to turn them into a multi-level penthouse on Central Park: https://www.newsweek.com/eric-trump-making-penthouse-real-estate-deal-dad-during-trump-campaign-782451 https://www.newsweek.com/eric-trump-making-penthouse-real-es... Would you honestly be surprised if Trump was engaging in low-grade real estate tax fraud to benefit his family?

_bxg1 8y ago

Assuming the documents are digitized, would probably be pretty easy to put together a neural network that pegs "interesting" documents for review. Not that it should be used as an authoritative judgement, but it sounds like so much stuff gets through the system just because there aren't enough eyes to check everything for the obvious markers.