There’s a bombshell of a story in this morning’s Oregonian describing the spectacular crash-and-burn of one of the Central Oregon real estate boom’s high rollers who the paper reports is now under investigation by the FBI and the IRS.
“As central Oregon’s long real estate gold rush gives way to a grim new era of falling prices and foreclosures, few companies have crashed to earth harder than Bend-based Desert Sun Development,” The Oregonian story begins.
“The upstart operation, led by its intense 29-year-old founder, Tyler Fitzsimons, is under siege from lenders, suppliers and contractors who say they’ve been stiffed for millions of dollars.
“But Desert Sun’s problems go well beyond clamoring creditors, The Oregonian found in its examination of the company. It offered a homeownership program to more than 30 people, mostly employees, that has left many participants deeply in debt for houses that aren’t complete or even started.
“The employee program is one of several aspects of Desert Sun that have drawn the attention of FBI and IRS agents in recent months. According to people quizzed by the agents, investigators are focusing on Desert Sun’s financing and its relationship with a bevy of Oregon banks, which threw millions of dollars at the company.
“The unfolding saga reflects how the financial industry operated in central Oregon and elsewhere during the real estate boom. Banks lined up to back newly minted companies. They made huge loans to workers of limited means who couldn’t afford the payments.”
According to The Oregonian, when Fitzsimons was flying high he indulged himself by purchasing “expensive toys, including a 2006 Ferrari 430 Spider, boasting a base ticket price in excess of $200,000.” Read the whole story on-line here.
Fitzsimons denies any wrongdoing. “There’s nothing malicious going on,”
he told The Oregonian. “Yes, we’re a victim of the market decline. But
so is everybody else.”
As of this morning, Desert Sun’s website, desertsundevelopmentinc.com, apparently had been taken down.
The Eye is wondering why The Bulletin didn’t jump all over this story. There were plenty of red flags about Fitzsimons and his company in the paper’s own “News of Record” section, which reports lawsuit filings. Fitzsimons and/or Desert Sun have been named as defendants in no fewer than 17 suits filed by a swarm of suppliers, lenders and contractors going back to June 27, 2007.
This article appears in May 15-21, 2008.
MAKE LOCAL JOURNALISM HAPPEN
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
People mocked me, ridiculed me, for pointing out this sort of behavior is not only unsustainable but may very well be illegal. Mock me now…
I love how Fitzsimons says, â Yes, we’re a victim…” Maybe he should go into Politics.
Welcome to Central Oregon!
Greed on all sides here, from the owner to employees. When it looks too good to be true…
What I find shocking is that Columbia River Bank gave his new company a $4.3MM line of credit (which I will bet expired yesterday). People don’t seem to be learning, or are too cheap to do due diligence, which is TRULY SCARY.
It is very clear that Fitzsimons expanded his company to fast with borrowed money, and then could not pay the loans when they came due. He then offered employees and friends fraudulent based loans taken out in their names with a promise of a new home. little did they know this was just a con job to fund his failing business leaving them responsible for the loan. What a snake, He will get what he deserves when the investigation is complete.
Even more appalling is Community First, Bend’s only honest to goodness “local” bank, involvement.
Bank of the Cascades is Bend’s first, 30 years?, and only local bank until recently, I don’t think Community First started in Bend. Bank of the Cascades was smart enough NOT to loan to Desert Sun!
Funny how the VP of Desert Sun Dev. Shannon Egland is never mentioned? Where does his role fall? Out of the 30 employees who did the program only 8 have field law suits. Where does the buck stop hereâ ¦.. Should Tyler be held accountable for everything?
The only truth to the matter is that if Tyler would of been honest from the start, there never evere would of been a DSD company. The investigation will start at the very begining of Tyler’s deception, aound 1998. The guy has been stealing and defrauding folks for a very long time. It’s just sad to see so many innocent people get hammered, everybody he touched got burned. Con men only get away with it for so long, that’s why they made soap on a rope. Mr. Egeland and others haven’t been mentioned I would assume because, there’s no evidence to support those kind of allegations. If there was any type of proof against others as there is against Mr. Fitzsimons, then the media would be having a field day on them also. Think about what he had to gain, he’s the only one that hasn’t lost anything. Really funny how that’s worked for him.
Egeland was/is every bit as responsible as Fitzsimons for the fraudulent business practices at DSD. I know this because he offered me the opportunity to participate in the obtain a construction load, build a home, sell the home, split the profit program. Egeland went on to explain to me how DSD could give
away 50% of the profit, just for using my credit. I declined as the explanation sure sounded like tax fraud to me. Egeland went on to tell me they were “too smart to get caught”.
How is it tax fraud almost burned? It’s only fraud if you the home owner don’t claim the profit that you made selling the house. Sounds like your making up stories about stuff you don’t have a clue about. From the sounds of things it looks as if DSD never gave away 50% to anybody. So we can conclude from other postings out there that Fitzsimons and Kendall where “the money guys” of the company and lined there pockets. Where you part of the scam? So with that being said, they where screwing the employee out of money from the get go. Sounds like you where the only one that thought tax fraud was a problem, maybe because you have first hand knowledge of how to defraud UncleSam out of money? Maybe you’ve been caught before and couldn’t afford to get caught again. If you thought it was so bad then why didn’t you alert the police to investigate this so called “bad crime?” Think of the heroe you would of been, saving all those people from getting burned. It really again looks to me like, “you don’t have a clue.” Good luck!!!
truth, who are you really?
Nothing makes an argument so compelling as one riddled with grammatical errors. To the person naming him/herself Truth: “where” is used in reference to a location, such as, “where are you?” The word you meant to use, over and over again, is “were.” Also, “your” indicates possession, as in, “your lack of education is obvious.” “You’re” means you are. There were many others but I will leave it at that for the sake of brevity. No one can be expected to take you seriously when you can barely write.