The former owner of a mobile home park in the Rochester area has agreed to pay $135,000 over allegations it submitted false claims to a state program intended to curb evictions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The settlement, announced Thursday by the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office, stems from a 2024 lawsuit that alleges Sun Communities had violated the Minnesota False Claims Act between 2021 and 2022 by seeking to evict tenants from the park in Stewartville — while at the same time collecting payments from the state’s RentHelpMN program.
RentHelpMN was created during COVID to prevent evictions by helping struggling families pay rent and utilities. To receive the funding, landlords were required to certify that they would not evict tenants for nonpayment.
“What Sun Communities did was unlawful,” Attorney General Keith Ellison said in a statement. “The pandemic created economic hardship, so the government stepped up and helped struggling families make rent payments. It is disappointing that any property owner would accept those payments and then still try to evict their tenants.”
As part of the settlement, Sun Communities also agreed to provide its residents with a 30-day notice before filing any eviction action, the Attorney General’s Office said.
The allegations against Sun Communities, a real estate conglomerate with more than 650 properties across the country, were brought forward by a whistleblower who lived in the mobile home park.
Sun Communities sold the property last year to Utah-based Havenpark Communities for $40.5 million.
The company did not respond to a request for comment.
