MV Realty update: Listing agreements terminated in Florida 

Thousands of homeowners are being released from their controversial contracts with MV Realty, a company that is currently in bankruptcy court and is facing lawsuits in multiple states.

Filings in several Florida counties this week show a termination of the Homeowner Benefit Agreement, which confirms that the listed homeowner is released from the restrictions that were in place. 

The so-called benefit agreement offered a homeowner up to $5,000 in exchange for giving MV Realty exclusive rights to sell their home over the next 40 years. The company also placed what amounted to a lien on those homes and charged 3% to have it removed.

States pushed back: The company has referred to its business model as "innovative," but several attorneys general considered it to be predatory. MV Realty has been sued by at least 11 states and has had its license revoked in some, including Colorado and Florida.

Action to terminate the agreements between MV Realty and homeowners is now gaining momentum across the country. Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser filed a lawsuit at the end of April seeking to release all existing customers from their agreements, and Minnesota reached a settlement with the company that included canceling these agreements. In Washington state, these agreements are now capped at five years.

"Minnesotans deserve to know what they're signing up for, not just in some fine print buried a sub-contract away, but up-front and obvious," Minnesota Attorney General Ellison said. "We talked to hundreds of people across the state, and they all told us the same thing: If I'd have understood what I was signing, I never would have done it."

Real Estate News has reached out to MV Realty for comment.

MV put up an 'outrageous' fight: Matt Weidner, a Florida attorney who was one of the first to file a complaint against the company back in 2021, is pleased to see consumers being released from these agreements, even if it has taken years to get to this point.

"Instead of just admitting that they were wrong, the fight that they put up was really outrageous," Weidner said. "To keep fighting in the manner in which they did just shows a level of depravity."

Weidner first heard about the agreements from a client who was trying to close on a house sale, but MV Realty was holding his proceeds "hostage." He noted that these agreements were pushed during the early days of the pandemic, when people could be in a tough situation and needed some cash.

"I couldn't believe the facts that he was describing," Weidner said. "It was just outrageous to me that somebody could put something like that in writing."

Some homeowners have paid MV Realty fees to get out of their contracts, and Weidner said it is unclear whether they will get that money back. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in September 2023, and those consumers may be low on the creditor list.

Could it have been stopped earlier? Looking back at how this transpired, Weidner said more should have been done by real estate regulatory organizations to put a stop to MV Realty's tactics.

"That's the true breakdown … this should have been stopped by the real estate regulatory body," Weidner said.

Real Estate News has also reached out to the Florida Real Estate Commission for comment.