Rishi Kapoor is seeking a federal judge’s OK to list his waterfront Cocoplum waterfront home for $8.5 million through a “uniquely qualified and motivated” sales agent: his wife, Jenni Frank Kapoor.
It’s the latest development involving the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s federal lawsuit against the embattled ex-CEO of Coral Gables-based Location Ventures. Kapoor needs approval from Chief U.S. District Judge Cecilia Altonaga to sell the couple’s six-bedroom home at 7233 Los Pinos Boulevard in Coral Gables, a motion filed Monday states.
In the motion, Kapoor asks Altonaga to remove the 6,000-square-foot house from the assets she froze in late December, and to also issue a stay in the pending foreclosure case against the property in Miami-Dade Circuit Court. However, Brenda Lee, the Altonaga-appointed receiver managing Location Ventures and other affiliates, is objecting to Kapoor’s requests, including allowing his wife to market and sell the estate, the motion states.
Fred Schwartz, Kapoor’s attorney, and Lee both declined to comment.
In the Miami-Dade case, a private lender — an entity managed by Robert Gutlohn in Coral Gables — is seeking the appointment of a receiver to take over an entity owned by the Kapoors that purchased the home in 2021. The lender is also arguing that the property is not subject to proceedings in the SEC federal case, court records show.
In September, Gutlohn’s entity sued the Kapoors and their entity, alleging they owe $4.6 million in principal and interest on a loan that the couple took out in 2021. At the time, the mortgage partially financed the Kapoors’ $5.9 million purchase of the half-acre property.
Kapoor’s wife obtained her real estate agent’s license in January and joined South Miami-based Boschetti Realty Group a month later, according to the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation licensing portal.
The motion states that Kapoor’s wife would earn the standard 6 percent commission from the sale of the home, or about $510,000 if it sells at the listing price of $8.5 million. She would share 1.5 percent of her commission with Boschetti. The Kapoors could also realize about $3 million in equity from the sale after paying off the delinquent loan, Kapoor’s motion states.
Lee, the receiver, doesn’t have a problem with Boschetti listing the home, but she objects to Kapoor’s wife as the listing agent and participating in the commission of the sale, the motion states.
“There is no basis to deprive Jennie Frank Kapoor from participating financially or otherwise in the sale of the property,” Kapoor’s motion states. “To the contrary…she is uniquely qualified and motivated to advocate for a sale beneficial to all potential interests. Depriving her of the ability to earn a living, particularly in the face of the freeze on all of her husband’s assets, serves no purpose and is unjustifiably punitive.”
Despite having no authority or interest in the Cocoplum estate, the receiver is demanding that any “yield equity” from a potential sale be provided to the receiver for the “satisfaction of anticipated restitution/disgorgement obligations” to the 50 investors who allegedly lost more than $93 million in Kapoor’s failed real estate projects, the motion states.
The potential profits the Kapoor may realize “would not be subject to claw back by the Receiver nor would it be subject to disgorgement by the [SEC],” the motion states.
“In summary, the receiver has asserted no ownership interest in the property, yet seeks to restrict both Mr. and Mrs. Kapoor’s ability to reclaim their undivided interest in the property’s equity,” the motion states.