Texas Files Suit Against ‘Colony Ridge’ Developer for Allegedly Luring Migrants into Foreclosure Scheme

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) has filed suit against the real estate developers behind “Colony Ridge,” the sprawling development northeast of Houston, for allegedly luring migrants into a foreclosure scheme.

Paxton announced the lawsuit against Colony Ridge on Thursday, accusing the real estate developers of operating a business model “predicated on churning land purchasers through a foreclosure mill.”

“Namely, Colony Ridge targets foreign-born and Hispanic consumers with limited or no access to credit with promises of cheap, ready-to-build land and financing without proof of income,” Paxton said in a statement.

Also, Paxton accuses Colony Ridge of purposefully misrepresenting the conditions of their “ready-to-build” land. After migrants have purchased the lots, Paxton alleges, they are unable to build on the properties because of the poor conditions.

From there, Paxton says Colony Ridge forecloses on the migrants and repossesses the land to sell it again to unsuspecting migrants who end up in the same situation.

“… a Colony Ridge representative testified before the Texas Senate that CR Land’s foreclosure rate is 12 percent,” the lawsuit states:

This alarming figure is roughly 50 times greater than the 2023 nationwide foreclosure rate of 0.26% (roughly 1 in every 400 homes were foreclosed in the United States in 2023). Even in 2009, at the height of the U.S. housing crisis, the foreclosure rate was only 2.22% nationwide (roughly 1 in every 45 homes were foreclosed). On information and belief, Colony Ridge’s profitability rests in no small part on the one-two-punch of its systemic deceptions coupled with this foreclosure operation. [Emphasis added]

The scheme, Paxton alleges, has forced neighboring communities to bear “a tremendous cost for the scheme,” while making “Colony Ridge’s developers a fortune.”

Last year, Paxton informed members of Congress that the Colony Ridge development “appears to be attracting and enabling illegal alien settlement in the state of Texas and distressing neighboring cities and school districts.”

Paxton accused Texas State Rep. Ernest Bailes (R) and State Sen. Robert Nichols (R) of “working to enrich specific developers at enormous expense to the rest of the public and reducing the quality of life for their own constituents” with a “specific arrangement” to help Colony Ridge’s scheme flourish.

The lawsuit asks the court to require Colony Ridge to halt its alleged predatory practices and foreclosure scheme, as well as have the real estate developers make “full restitution to all consumers who have suffered losses as a result of the acts and practices alleged in this complaint and any other acts or practices proved by the state.”

The case is Texas v. Colony Ridge, Inc., No. 4:24-cv-00941 in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.