Monarch Investment and Management Group: Billing, Fraud, and Evictions

Monarch Investment and Management Group, one of the largest apartment owners in the United States, has faced lawsuits and regulatory actions alleging illegal utility billing in Minnesota, fraud against a pandemic rental-assistance program, undisclosed tenant fees, and family-status housing discrimination. Some of these matters have settled; others remain active in court.

Minnesota Class Action Over Utility Billing

The longest-running case against Monarch is Bautista v. Monarch Investments, Case No. 55-CV-22-1874, filed in Olmsted County District Court and also known as the HOME Line settlement. The tenant advocacy group HOME Line and 11 individual plaintiffs alleged that Monarch used illegal advertising, leasing, collection, and eviction practices across its Minnesota properties.¹

The central practice at issue was “ratio billing.” According to the plaintiffs and the Olmsted County judge who ruled in the case, Monarch measured utilities through a single building meter and then divided the costs among tenants, which the court found violated Minnesota’s single-metered utility billing statute, the state’s Prevention of Consumer Fraud Act, and the Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act.² Monarch denied the allegations in the settlement agreement, and the case resolved through negotiation rather than a trial verdict.¹

Who Was Covered and What They Received

The settlement class covers tenants who signed a Minnesota lease with Monarch before February 1, 2022, with subclasses extending to tenants at specific properties through June 1, 2024. Eligible class members who filed timely claims could receive a $125 base payment. Members of the First Utilities Subclass were entitled to 115% of all water and sewer charges paid from the start of their lease through February 1, 2022, and members of the Second Utilities Subclass were entitled to 115% of water and sewer charges paid through June 1, 2024. Monarch is also responsible for up to $150,000 in attorneys’ fees and expenses for class counsel and up to $7,500 for each of the 11 class representatives.¹ The total settlement fund was not publicly disclosed.

Current Status

The court granted final approval, and the case has moved into distribution.³ Digital payment emails began going out on June 6, 2025, and were available to claim through September 4, 2025. The deadline to submit a claim form was September 16, 2025.⁴ Both deadlines have passed.

Minnesota Attorney General’s False Claims Act Case

In a separate and more recent action, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison intervened in a whistleblower lawsuit accusing Monarch and 17 affiliated companies of defrauding the state’s pandemic rental assistance program and charging tenants a series of illegal fees. The case, filed in Hennepin County District Court as Case No. 27-CV-24-3727, began as a qui tam action brought by two former Monarch tenants in Rochester: Kiona Adams, who lived at Gates of Rochester, and Corey Dahl, who lived at a Crystal Bay property.⁵

RentHelpMN Fraud Allegations

The complaint alleges that Monarch violated the Minnesota False Claims Act by submitting false certifications to the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency to receive funds through RentHelpMN, which operated from April 2021 through January 2022. Landlords who accepted the funds certified that they would not evict tenants for nonpayment of rent for the months the aid covered, and would not initiate new eviction proceedings within 30 days of receiving the money.⁵

According to the state, Monarch collected approximately $259,000 in RentHelpMN funds and broke both promises. The complaint alleges Monarch filed at least 12 eviction actions within 30 days of receiving aid and at least 32 eviction actions for nonpayment of rent during months that had already been covered.⁶ As one example, the Gates of Rochester entity received $9,750.77 in RentHelpMN funds for Kiona Adams around October 2021, then filed an eviction complaint against her on January 14, 2022.⁵

Illegal Fee Allegations

The same complaint accuses Monarch of charging tenants fees that were either not disclosed in lease agreements or were presented in a confusing way. Those included a $50 monthly fee for administering utility billing, $25 late fees on garage rentals that were not disclosed in leases, monthly charges of $30 to $75 for “non-compliance” with renter’s insurance requirements, and several hundred dollars in fees tied to eviction actions the state says were themselves unlawful.⁶

What the State Is Seeking

The state is seeking treble damages under the False Claims Act, which would total roughly $777,000 (three times the $259,000 allegedly collected), plus civil penalties for each false claim, attorneys’ fees, and restitution for tenants charged illegal fees. The AG is also asking the court to permanently enjoin the challenged fee practices.⁶ The state has demanded a jury trial, and the case remained active as of late August 2025.⁵

HUD Fair Housing Complaint in Michigan

In February 2018, four Michigan Fair Housing Centers filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development alleging that Monarch discriminated against families with children by enforcing a blanket two-people-per-bedroom occupancy rule regardless of a unit’s actual square footage. Testing at 14 Monarch locations in 2017 identified roughly 30 floor plans large enough to legally accommodate more occupants than Monarch’s policy allowed, including one master bedroom of 320 square feet that applicable state and local law said could house six people.⁷

In September 2019, Monarch entered a conciliation agreement through HUD, agreeing to pay $130,000 to the Fair Housing Centers, revise its occupancy policy to be no more restrictive than applicable local codes, and train employees on fair housing law. HUD did not make a determination on the merits of the underlying allegations.⁷

Pandemic Eviction Practices

Although not a lawsuit itself, a 2022 Bloomberg investigation titled “Wolf of Main Street” documents the eviction practices that underlie several of the Minnesota allegations. Bloomberg reported that in St. Louis and Kansas City alone, Monarch filed over 1,000 eviction cases between March 2020 and March 2022, a period when federal moratoriums were supposed to limit displacement. At one 756-unit St. Louis complex, Oak Park Apartments, the company filed 480 eviction cases during its ownership. An internal executive report cited by Bloomberg indicated that more than half of tenants who received an eviction notice paid and stayed, roughly a quarter left voluntarily, 10% were physically evicted, and 0.2% declared bankruptcy.⁸

Bloomberg reported that CEO Bob Nicolls described federal eviction bans as a “nuisance” and framed the end of pandemic protections as a chance for “popping the clutch” on rents. An attorney who represented Monarch, Matthew Chase, was recorded during an October 2020 virtual meeting instructing landlords to file eviction cases regardless of the CDC moratorium and not to inform tenants of their rights under it.⁸

About the Company

Monarch has been active in commercial real estate since 1992 and is privately owned by Bob Nicolls and his family.⁹ As of 2026, the company reports managing 80,347 apartment units across 344 communities in 25 states.¹⁰ The National Multifamily Housing Council ranked it eighth in the country among apartment owners in 2025, with 75,871 units owned.¹¹ A 2022 Bloomberg investigation reported that Monarch focuses on aging garden-apartment complexes in secondary and tertiary markets with high poverty rates and limited tenant protections, and that its portfolio roughly doubled between 2016 and 2022.⁸

1
Homeline Settlement. Bautista v. Monarch Investments Settlement Notice
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KTTC. Property Management Group Ordered to Pay for Illegally Charging Tenants
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Homeline Settlement. Bautista v. Monarch Investments Settlement Documents
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Homeline Settlement. Bautista v. Monarch Investments Settlement FAQ
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Minnesota Attorney General. State of Minnesota Complaint in Intervention
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KAAL TV. AG Keith Ellison Sues Minnesota Apartment Owner for Defrauding State, Charging Tenants Illegal Fees
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Fair Housing Center of Michigan. HUD Complaint Resolved for $130,000, Policy Changes Against Property Management Firm
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Bloomberg. Monarch Investment Rental Properties Investigation
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National Apartment Association. Monarch Investment Management Group
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MIMG Investment. About Monarch Investment and Management Group
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National Multifamily Housing Council. Top Owners List