Some buyers and creditors who lost money in convicted developer Rishi Kapoor’s real estate schemes could split roughly $3.5 million in receivership funds.
Bankruptcy attorney Bernice Lee, the court-appointed receiver for Kapoor’s defunct firm Location Ventures and its affiliates, is seeking authorization from U.S. District Court Judge Jacqueline Becerra to distribute the money. It would satisfy claims tied to Villa Valencia, a Coral Gables condominium completed in 2022, and a failed co-living condo development in Miami Beach, court records show.
In May, Kapoor pleaded guilty to two felony counts of money laundering and payroll tax evasion conspiracy. His sentencing is scheduled for August. Kapoor was facing 37 criminal counts when he was arrested in March, three years after investigators opened a criminal probe into his dealings as CEO of Location Ventures, the development company he founded in 2016 that imploded six years later amid lawsuits from investors, lenders and contractors.
As part of his guilty plea, Kapoor admitted he misappropriated $85 million from investors for his failed real estate projects, including siphoning millions for his personal benefit. He also unlawfully used $10.6 million in deposits from buyers who purchased 20 preconstruction units in Location Ventures’ condo projects in Coconut Grove, Coral Gables and Miami Beach, Kapoor’s plea agreement states.
Since Coral Gables-based Location Ventures collapsed in 2023, Lee has been tasked with selling its assets, including the sites of unfinished developments in Miami-Dade County, to pay back creditors as part of a related federal civil lawsuit filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission. In 2024, Kapoor and the SEC entered into a settlement agreement without him admitting or denying the federal agency’s accusations that he misappropriated $93 million from more than 50 investors.
Two years after the SEC’s legal action, some creditors may be getting some of their money.
On June 19, Becerra approved Lee’s request to repay 10 percent deposits to 38 buyers who signed purchase agreements for units at Urbin Miami Beach, a co-living condominium that Kapoor planned at 1234 and 1260 Washington Avenue in Miami Beach. City officials halted work on the project in 2023 because Location Ventures had not obtained building permits. Construction did not resume and last year Lee sold the property for $17.5 million. The sale proceeds were used to pay off a lender that had filed for foreclosure.
However, Lee successfully secured a $1.7 million payment in February from a surety company that insured the Location Ventures’ project when it was being built, according to a May motion. Those funds will be used to repay the 38 buyers, a majority of whom placed deposits of 50 percent or more. Three other buyers will get their 10 percent deposits refunded from money that was held in escrow, the motion states.
The buyers are from South Florida and other parts of the state, Dallas, New York, Argentina, Bolivia and Mexico, court records show.
Also last month, Lee filed a motion seeking permission to distribute $1.8 million from the $3 million sale of a 12th floor unit at Villa Valencia, a 13-story condominium that Location Ventures opened in 2022. The funds would partially pay claims by more than two dozen creditors with liens and lawsuits tied to the condo project, including building contractors and Mironest CG, a buyer seeking to recoup a $3 million deposit for an unfinished Villa Valencia penthouse.
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