Series of lawsuits against North Jersey real estate influencers allege history of fraud

A real estate influencer couple could be in hot water as lawsuits begin to pile up against them, accusing them of bogus deals.

A lawsuit filed by Anthony Barone and Anthony Martini on July 6 is just one of the latest against Cesar and Jennifer Pina, alleging the pair defrauded the victims out of money. Barone and Martini accused the Pinas of taking $1.5 million from them for a real estate venture in Paterson called the Taylor Apartments.

At least four other fraud lawsuits have been filed in the last two months against the Pinas and their companies.

The phone number for Cesar Pina's one-on-one real estate consultation business did not have voicemail set up, and multiple texts to the number have not been returned. Their most recent flipping_nj post on Instagram was on July 10.

Cesar Pina appeared to be a real estate influencer on the rise, with a commitment to philanthropy in North Jersey, a view that contrasts with the allegations made in the lawsuits. His Instagram page has over 306,000 followers.

Pina's website said he became involved in real estate in 2006 and partnered with radio personality RaaShaun Casey, known as DJ Envy, to host touring real estate seminars across the tri-state area. Jennifer Pina is a real estate agent.

In 2018, one of the Pinas' LLCs purchased the old Paterson School 5 on Totowa Avenue.

Days after Andre Sayegh became Paterson's mayor in July 2018, he and Cesar Pina held a press conference to announce that the real estate investor would be donating $30,000 to fix eight city-owned baseball and softball fields.

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“I wanted to give back to the Paterson community and asked Mayor Sayegh for suggestions on ways I can help," Pina said at the time. "Sprucing up the ballfields seemed like the perfect match, because I believe strongly in the importance of recreation for children throughout the city.”

Pina's contribution was supposed to go to the city through the OnePaterson nonprofit group set up by the mayor's supporters. City officials involved in the deal said Pina ended up contributing just $20,000, stiffing Paterson for the other money.

Lawsuits Cesar Pina and Jennifer Pina face

On May 15, Amy Flips LLC of New York accused Pina and his companies, Whairhouse LLC and From Start 2 Flipping LLC, of fraud in $500,000 investments in real estate in Maplewood and Hawthorne from September 2022.

“Cesar Pina represented that if Plaintiff provided [$250,000.00] for the purchase of the first property located in Maplewood, NJ, Defendants would be able to complete the renovations, sell the renovated property and return to Plaintiff her money plus an additional 20% within [five] months,” the lawsuit said.

Amy Flips LLC sent a number of messages to Pina between March 1 and March 22 asking for information about project statuses and when he would be making required and past-due payments, which the lawsuit said were never made.

On June 9, Onsight Properties accused Pina and his companies of fraud involving $200,000 and $100,000 real estate investments in two Paterson properties in October and December 2022.

The lawsuit said that once Pina got Onsight Properties' capital, he stopped responding to its questions and "became elusive." Between December 2022 and mid-May 2023, Pina did not contact the company or respond to its communication attempts, the suit said.

Onsight Properties and Cesar Pina met on March 30, and the company was told the projects were going as planned, the market was "great" and the company should sell in early April, the lawsuit said. On May 19, Pina provided two checks, one for $100,000 and another for $37,000, but told Onsight Properties not to cash or deposit the checks until early June.

“Upon information and belief, the two checks provided to Plaintiff were invalid, drawn on an account with insufficient funds, and were intended to deceive [Onsight Properties] into believing he was going to receive the money he was promised,” the lawsuit said.

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On June 16, Trevor Roman of New York City accused Cesar Pina, Whairhouse LLC and From Start 2 Flipping LLC of fraud in an alleged Ponzi scheme that started with a $100,000 real estate investment Roman said he made with Pina in October 2020.

Roman said Pina promised a $30,000 return on a deal involving the renovation of a property on Harding Avenue in Clifton. The lawsuit said Pina paid Roman $30,000 about five months later, but rolled over the original $100,000 investment, along with an extra $50,000 Roman put up in another deal.

After a series of additional deals, Pina owed Roman $280,000 by April, the lawsuit said.

Pina blocked Roman's phone number or changed his phone number “in what appears to be part of an effort to dodge Plaintiff and his other apparent creditors and/or victims of what may be a widespread fraud scheme,” the suit said.

“In or around May 2023, several high-profile social media figures and celebrities began to share information on social media to the effect that Defendant Pina had scammed or defrauded them out of several hundred thousand dollars or more, with one victim claiming to have been taken for one million dollars,” continued the lawsuit.

On June 28, Ransome Endeavors Inc., a New York business, sued Pina claiming fraud involving a $200,000 real estate investment in Hawthorne, with allegations similar to those in the Roman lawsuit.

Pina "stressed that he works with numerous celebrities, his past projects have all been extremely successful and that he was so successful that ... Cesar Pina was collaborating on a television show for A&E with his partner DJ Envy and celebrity musician 50 Cent,” the lawsuit said, using language seen in other complaints.

The complaint said Ransome told Pina earlier this year that it wanted its money back. On April 20, Pina provided $30,000, half of the promised interest and none of the $200,000 principal.

“Between April 20 and June 10, [Ransome] regularly contacted ... Cesar Pina, to inquire about the status of the project and when it should be receiving the funds it was owed,” the lawsuit said.

According to the lawsuit, Pina was often unresponsive, but when he did get in contact with Ransome, he always said "the closing was imminent but was delayed for some reason or another."

Pina "regularly stated that the closing was scheduled to be completed in a few weeks and Plaintiff would receive all the funds owed to it immediately thereafter,” said the lawsuit.

But he never paid, the suit said.

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Andrew Kravis of Kravis & Associates in Michigan, who is representing plaintiffs in three of the cases, did not immediately respond to a call for comment.

Sean Mack and Darcy Baboulis-Gyscek represent Barone and Martini, and Alexander Schachtel represents Roman.

In May 2020, an architect sued the Pinas over the Taylor Court Apartment project, the one in which Barone and Martini invested, after he said the Pinas failed to pay him for his services. The suit said they gave him a $50,000 deposit but still owed him $109,000. The suit was later dismissed in December 2020 because of a lack of prosecution.

Influencers and modern culture

Kelli S. Burns, an associate professor who studies social media at the University of South Florida, said the parasocial relationship people have with influencers leads to trust.

"When we engage with people online, we start to have a parasocial relationship with them where we believe that this person is our friend," Burns said. "And because we believe they're our friend, we tend to trust them more and see them as an authentic person that is giving good advice."

An influencer's use of celebrities also gives an appearance of validity to whatever they are promoting because it seems as if that celebrity has provided a testimonial, Burns said.

A search on Instagram of flipping_nj showed at least two other accounts that allegedly belong to Cesar Pina. One of the accounts shows him with celebrities like 50 Cent, Post Malone and Snoop Dogg.

"In the end, we don't know these influencers personally," Burns said. "We only know the curated life that they have provided to us online. And so if there's anything in their past, whether it's bad business dealings or criminal investigations or anything like that, we may not be aware of that. Because they are showing us what they want us to see."

Burns said many successful influencers establish a niche for themselves, and many people see that as a way to control their own "destiny." But she believes that people are becoming more wary of influencers and their products and are realizing that some influencers are being paid large amounts of money to promote products.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Cesar Pina, NJ real estate influencer, faces fraud lawsuits