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Chicago

A Chicago real estate family’s troublesome tax history

How the Nitchoffs avoided paying hundreds of thousands of dollars by paying a fraction of what they owed

Boris Nitchoff and properties at 606 E. 142nd Street, 15825 Dixie Highway, 420 E. 142nd Street (Credit: Facebook, Google Maps)
Boris Nitchoff and properties at 606 E. 142nd Street, 15825 Dixie Highway, 420 E. 142nd Street (Credit: Facebook, Google Maps)

The Nitchoff property tax shell game saga continues.

An investigation by the Chicago Sun-Times found that the Nitchoff family had been avoiding paying taxes for years through a scheme in which they would buy their own tax debt with affiliated companies for a fraction of the cost.

Boris Nitchoff and his two sons, were under federal investigation earlier this year for their ties to Alderman Carrie Austin (34th).

Now, documents acquired by the Sun-Times show that Nitchoff owed $861,000 in overdue tax bills. He then used his grandson’s company, 9C LLC to purchase $734,428 of the owed taxes for Mako Properties Inc. for a price tag of $5,650. This covered taxes owed on five of the seven properties the 77-year-old owns through his companies.

His method of avoiding tax payments and then using another one of his companies to buy out the taxes has been used on seven properties. They are: 15825 and 15827 Dixie Highway, Harvey;1415 E. 142nd St., Dolton; 1869 Sibley Blvd., Calumet City; 13825 Park Ave., Dolton; 420 E. 142nd St., Dolton; 606 E. 142nd St., Dolton.

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Nitchoff used another one of his companies, B. Hartman Group, to pay off more taxes on two of the properties. He paid just $20,630 to buy the $126,583 owed. Unfortunately for him, his tactics violate state law and Nitchoff apparently knows it.

“We thought about it — because the company is under different companies, different owners, it’s not the owner of deed,” he told the Sun-Times. “In a way, it could be legal. But I just didn’t want to create problems for the boys and me.”

Records show that even after purchasing the $861,000 in taxes that they have failed to pay property taxes on all of the seven properties which totals to $1.68 million.

The Nitchoff family has won tens of millions of dollars in public contracts to soundproof homes near O’Hare and Midway airports, and to rehab porches and roofs for low-income homeowners across the city.

Nitchoff and his two sons, Alex nitchoff and Constantino Nitchoff, were named in a federal search warrant related to Ald. Carrie Austin and her chief of staff, Chester Wilson. [Sun-Times] — Jacqueline Flynn

 

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Property Taxes