Veterans United Class Action Lawsuit: Claims, Class, and Status

The Veterans United class action lawsuit is a federal case filed in February 2026 accusing Veterans United Home Loans, the country’s largest VA mortgage lender, of running an illegal kickback and steering scheme that pushed military homebuyers into costlier loans while secretly splitting commissions with a network of real estate agents. The suit, Peyton v. Veterans United Home Loans, et al. (Case No. 2:26-cv-04039), was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri and alleges violations of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA), along with state consumer protection claims.¹

The case is being led by Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro, the same firm behind the Moehrl and Sitzer/Burnett real estate commission cases.² It was originally brought by three named plaintiffs: Christian Peyton, an Army Reserve and National Guard veteran from Tennessee; Salem Zahn, a Marine Corps veteran from Texas; and Ernest Easter, an Army veteran from Pennsylvania. After an amended complaint filed on May 4, 2026, the plaintiff group grew to fifteen.³ Chief Magistrate Judge Willie J. Epps, Jr. is presiding.⁴

What the Lawsuit Alleges

The complaint describes what it calls a “perpetual loop of illegal referrals and kickbacks.” According to the plaintiffs, Veterans United captured leads through its website and distributed those potential homebuyers to a network of more than 5,000 independent real estate agents.⁵ In exchange, agents were allegedly required to steer clients back to Veterans United for financing. When a deal closed, the agent had to pay roughly 35% of their commission (about 1.05% of the home’s sale price) to Veterans United Realty.⁶

Agents who did not push clients toward Veterans United loans, or who helped clients explore competing lenders, were allegedly cut off from future referrals.⁷ The suit says Veterans United enforced the arrangement through a proprietary app called AgentDash, in which agents had to log client progress, coordinate with an assigned loan officer, and immediately notify the company if a client started shopping for alternative financing.¹

Veterans United Realty, operated by Realty Search Solutions, is characterized in the complaint as essentially a shell entity with no in-house agents. Its main function, the plaintiffs argue, was to collect the 35% commission payments.⁸

Deceptive Branding and Bait-and-Switch Claims

A second thread in the case concerns marketing. The plaintiffs accuse Veterans United of cultivating the impression that it is part of, or affiliated with, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Branding such as “The Nation’s #1 VA Lender” and patriotic imagery allegedly led borrowers to believe they were obligated to use the company, when it is a private, for-profit corporation with no government affiliation.⁷ Veterans United’s own realty website carries a disclaimer stating it is “NOT affiliated with any government agencies, including the VA.”⁹

The amended complaint added bait-and-switch allegations. The plaintiffs claim the lender offered borrowers favorable, non-fixed terms during initial rate shopping, then raised costs and interest rates at the lock phase while blaming market conditions. In one example, a loan officer allegedly increased a borrower’s rate by 0.25% over three days during a period when the mortgage market had actually improved by a comparable amount.¹⁰ Borrowers, the suit says, often accepted the higher rates because walking away would have cost them money they had already spent on the purchase process.

The alleged harm: veterans ended up with higher interest rates, steeper closing costs, and larger loan balances than they would have found elsewhere. Borrowers were also allegedly never told about first-time homebuyer assistance programs, because network agents were incentivized to keep them inside the Veterans United pipeline.⁵ None of the original plaintiffs, the complaint says, were told their agents were required to steer them to Veterans United or that a share of the commission was flowing back to the company.

Who Is Covered by the Proposed Class

The proposed class covers all individuals who purchased a home financed through Veterans United at any time since January 1, 2020. The amount in controversy is stated to exceed $5 million.¹¹ The class has not yet been certified by the court, and a decision on class certification would come after the pending motion to dismiss is resolved.

Legal Claims and Damages Sought

The case began with four claims in February 2026 and expanded to eight in the May 2026 amended complaint, which also incorporated testimony from real estate agents and loan officers.¹² The claims now include:

Two RESPA counts: one under 12 U.S.C. § 2607(a) targeting the alleged exchange of referrals for steering, and one under 12 U.S.C. § 2607(b) targeting the 35% commission payments as unearned fee-splitting.¹
Five state consumer protection claims covering Missouri, Illinois, New York, Ohio, and Texas.¹⁰
One count of unjust enrichment.

The plaintiffs are asking for treble damages under RESPA, disgorgement of profits, and injunctive relief.⁵

How Veterans United Is Responding

Veterans United has denied the allegations and moved to dismiss the case. Its initial motion, filed April 13, 2026, argues that the plaintiffs failed to plead “any concrete and particularized injury” and did not identify a specific actionable referral, thing of value, or charge actually paid by any of them.¹¹ On the merits, the company invokes RESPA’s safe harbor provision, contending that its arrangements qualify as legitimate “cooperative brokerage and referral arrangements between real estate agents and brokers.”⁶

The company calls the allegations “nonsensical” and accuses the plaintiffs of using “cut-and-paste” language borrowed from other lawsuits. It also argues that 13 of the 14 plaintiffs asserting RESPA claims did not allege they actually closed with an agent in the Veterans United Realty network, and that 11 of those claims are time-barred under RESPA’s one-year statute of limitations.⁶ The motion disputes the shell-company characterization of Veterans United Realty and includes screenshots of website disclaimers stating the company is not a federal agency. After the amended complaint was filed, Veterans United called it an addition of “volume and hyperbole, not substance” and moved to dismiss the expanded version as well.³

Where the Case Stands Now

As of mid-2026, the case is active before Judge Epps in the Western District of Missouri.¹³ The immediate question is whether the court will grant or deny Veterans United’s motion to dismiss the amended complaint. If the case survives, the next steps would be discovery, a ruling on class certification, and then either trial or settlement. No scheduling orders or settlement discussions have been reported publicly, and no class has been certified, so veterans who financed home purchases through the company since January 1, 2020 do not yet have a formal claims process to join. Steve Berman, the managing partner of Hagens Berman, has described the alleged conduct as “blatantly illegal practices that have harmed homebuyers through predatory loan practices.”¹⁴

1
ClassAction.org. Peyton et al. v. Veterans United Home Loans et al., Complaint
2
St. Louis Real Estate News. Missouri-Based Veterans United Sued in Federal Class Action
3
HousingWire. Veterans United Lawsuit Bait-and-Switch
4
PACER Monitor. Peyton et al. v. Veterans United Home Loans et al.
5
Mortgage Professional America. Three Veterans Sue Veterans United Over Alleged Illegal Kickback Scheme
6
HousingWire. Veterans United RESPA Dismissal
7
Hagens Berman. Lawsuit Accuses Veterans United Home Loans of Deceiving Military Homebuyers and Violating Real Estate Laws
8
ClassAction.org. Peyton et al. v. Veterans United Home Loans et al., Amended Complaint
9
Veterans United Realty. Disclaimer
10
Unlock Florida Homes. Amended Class Action Lawsuit Accuses Veterans United of Bait-and-Switch Tactics
11
HousingWire. Veterans United Moves To Dismiss RESPA Suit
12
RESPA News. Veterans United Says Amended Class Action Adds Volume and Hyperbole
13
Hagens Berman. Peyton v. Veterans United Home Loans
14
RISMedia. Veterans United Home Loans Class Action Lawsuit