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An Ex-Fox News Host Pitched 'Financial Freedom.' His Clients Want Their Money Back.
Source: New York Times
An Ex-Fox News Host Pitched ‘Financial Freedom.’ His Clients Want Their Money Back.
Clayton Morris has been sued by nearly two dozen customers who say they were sold ramshackle homes as investment properties.
By Matthew Goldstein
March 25, 2019
INDIANAPOLIS — Clayton Morris walked away from his job as a Fox News host in 2017 to devote himself to the next phase of his professional life: helping regular people achieve financial independence.
Mr. Morris, a host on “Fox and Friends Weekend,” already had a popular real estate investing podcast when he and his wife, Natali, decided to become full-time real estate advisers. Their plan was to connect mom-and-pop investors with turnkey investment homes in Detroit, Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Fla., and several other cities. Their company, Morris Invest, would handle the details: finding properties, overseeing renovations, hiring property managers to rent out the houses. All clients had to do was put up the cash and wait for the checks to arrive.
Morris Invest helped sell at least 1,000 properties over the past two years, reaping more than $5 million in referral fees and profits from the sales, according to resale prices and interviews with investors and a lawyer for a former business partner. But Mr. Morris’s customers said many of the homes in Indianapolis had cost them dearly.
Nearly two dozen customers are now suing Mr. Morris and his company. They contend that the properties were in worse shape than advertised, and that rehab work paid for upfront was done poorly or not at all. Vacant lots sold on the expectation of new homes being built are strewn with trash. One house gutted by fire was sold a few days later to an unwitting investor, according to a lawsuit.
-snip-
Clayton Morris has been sued by nearly two dozen customers who say they were sold ramshackle homes as investment properties.
By Matthew Goldstein
March 25, 2019
INDIANAPOLIS — Clayton Morris walked away from his job as a Fox News host in 2017 to devote himself to the next phase of his professional life: helping regular people achieve financial independence.
Mr. Morris, a host on “Fox and Friends Weekend,” already had a popular real estate investing podcast when he and his wife, Natali, decided to become full-time real estate advisers. Their plan was to connect mom-and-pop investors with turnkey investment homes in Detroit, Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Fla., and several other cities. Their company, Morris Invest, would handle the details: finding properties, overseeing renovations, hiring property managers to rent out the houses. All clients had to do was put up the cash and wait for the checks to arrive.
Morris Invest helped sell at least 1,000 properties over the past two years, reaping more than $5 million in referral fees and profits from the sales, according to resale prices and interviews with investors and a lawyer for a former business partner. But Mr. Morris’s customers said many of the homes in Indianapolis had cost them dearly.
Nearly two dozen customers are now suing Mr. Morris and his company. They contend that the properties were in worse shape than advertised, and that rehab work paid for upfront was done poorly or not at all. Vacant lots sold on the expectation of new homes being built are strewn with trash. One house gutted by fire was sold a few days later to an unwitting investor, according to a lawsuit.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/25/business/fox-news-clayton-morris-indianapolis.html
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