New York Attorney General Letitia James repeatedly listed her Virginia home as an “investment” property in financial disclosure forms, despite allegedly making false claims to a bank in order to secure a more favorable loan that barred her from using the property as a rental.

The indictment handed down Thursday centers on a single-family home in Norfolk, Virginia that was co-purchased by James in August 2020 for roughly $137,000, most of which was financed with a $109,600 loan that prohibited it from being used as a rental investment property, prosecutors have alleged. This allowed her to obtain favorable loan terms not available for investment properties,” prosecutors alleged in a five-page court filing, which allowed her to save “approximately $18,933 over the life of the loan.”

According to disclosures to the New York State Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government, which were reviewed by the New York Post,  the property is listed as an “investment” in the “real estate” section of James’ 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 disclosures to the commission. In 2024, she then designated the Norfolk home as a “real property” rather than an “investment,” however.

The indicted attorney general also estimated the value of the property anywhere between $150,000 and $200,000.

The 2024 disclosure was filed in May of this year, just a month after Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) Director William Pulte sent a criminal referral to the Justice Department alleging that James may have committed fraud by mischaracterizing the property in order to secure more favorable loan terms. It is unclear why James opted to change the word “investment” to “real property” on her 2024 disclosure.”

James also did not disclose any revenue generated from renting out the home on her disclosure forms from 2021 through 2024, despite the fact that it generated thousands of dollars, prosecutors allege.

In her 2020 disclosures, James noted that an “investment real property” in Norfolk brought in between $1,000 and $5,000 in income, the New York Post reported. It is unclear whether she was referring to the property at the center of the indictment, however.

James agreed to a “Second Home Rider” when she took out the loan, according to the indictment, which required the attorney general to “occupy and use the property as her secondary residence “occupy and use the property as her secondary residence, and prohibited its use as a timesharing or other shared ownership arrangement or agreement that requires her either to rent the property or give any other person any control over the occupancy or use of the property.”

“Despite these representations,” prosecutors wrote in the indictment, the Norfolk property “was not occupied or used by James as a secondary residence and was instead used as a rental investment property.”

In addition, James misrepresented her intended use of the property on a homeowners’ insurance application, which indicated the house would be “owner occupied.” On her federal tax forms, the attorney general classified the Norfolk home as “rental real estate,” reporting “thousand(s) of dollars in rents received” and “claiming deductions for expenses relating to the property,” according to the indictment.

When a New York Post reporter visited the property back in May, a longtime neighbor said she had never seen James there once.

A federal grand jury on Thursday opted to indict James on charges of bank fraud and making false claims to a financial institution, according to the Department of Justice. If convicted on both counts, James faces up to 60 years in prison and a fine of up to $2 million.

She is currently slated to make an initial court appearance on October 24.

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