Let's Play Southern Orange County's Favorite Game Show: Who Owns That LLC?
The good news is, winning this game will soon be much, much easier.
Starting last month, LLC and corporation owners are now required to disclose the identity of their owners to the federal government. If an LLC does not comply, they’ll be subject to daily fines of $500 and potential jail time.
This was done as part of a larger effort to stop criminals from laundering money here in the United States, which has become a haven for such crimes.
Anyone who owns 25% or more of an LLC are now required to submit their name, date of birth, personal address, and a government issued photo ID.
(There are two exceptions: If you make over $5M in annual revenue or if the LLC has been inactive prior to 2020 and it’s just sort of sitting there.)
So, this mean you can — in the not too distant future — submit FOIL requests to FinCen, which is the department managing and overseeing the LLC information gathering for the Department of Treasury.
But it won’t be an overnight thing.
LLCs have until December 31st, 2024 to comply with the new law.
That’s on the federal level.
What About Here In New York?
Here in New York, a new law also went into effect requiring LLC owners to identify themselves.
Unfortunately, Governor Kathy Hochul pulled a Cuomo, and at the very last second when she thought no one was looking, she watered down the New York law so that only law enforcement has access to the new New York database.
(The governor is deep in the pocket of real estate interests, much like her predecessor.)
So, the good news is that the LLC database does exist here in New York.
The bad news is, for now anyway, only the police and district attorneys can see it.
There are a lot of questions here, and I don’t have the answers about how that will work. Not many people do.
But what that means, for now, is that if you want to find out who owns an LLC in New York, you still have to do some leg work.
So, if you find yourself paying money to some rando LLC, or you’d like to know who’s buying up property in your area, here’s how to do it:
How To Find Out Who Owns An LLC In New York, Round 1
So, let’s use yesterday’s example of Keen Equities LLC.
According to The Times Herald Record, Keen Equities purchased a former country club in South Blooming Grove, New York, for $15 million in 2006.
Since that time, Keen Equities has been cited by the state Department of Environmental Conservation multiple times, and fined over a quarter of a million dollars, for ignoring multiple stop work orders.
According to these facts, this is probably something the State Attorney General should be looking into. But how can you file a report with the AG when you don’t know who the owner is?
So, I set out to find that person.
The first thing I did was google “Keen Equities LLC.”
That pulled up a bankruptcy filing from 2013 with an address for Keen listed at:
Keen Equities, LLC
1600 63rd Street
Brooklyn, NY 11210
KINGS-NY
Tax ID / EIN: 20-3410737
That EIN, by the way, is super important. That’s the identifying number provided by the state department in New York for an LLC and is used in lieu of a Social Security number for accepting money. So, sometimes with an LLC you can run a search with the LLC’s name + EIN: #
You can also search state DMV records using the EIN number and LLC address information. This might reveal vehicles owned by the LLC, and those records might have the name of an individual as well.
The second thing I did was look up that address on Google Maps.
This picture is not very helpful. And Brooklyn is a hike. So I went back to the search results.
During my second check of the google search results, I found this posting from the DEC that has a different address listed for Keen Equities. And, unlike the bankruptcy filing, this page from the DEC is from 2023. So it’s recent.
The address provided by the DEC is:
KEEN EQUITIES LLC
4922 11th Ave
BROOKLYN, NY 11219
Back to Google Maps …
Ok. So, that totally looks like a residence. Nothing wrong with running a business out of your home. I’ve been doing it for years throughout the state.
But this photo also doesn’t help me identify who the owner is. So …
This time, I googled just the address of the LLC: 4922 11th Ave
BROOKLYN, NY 11219
Total dead end, at least online. Offline, I COULD FOIL the property records from the Office of the City Register.
But let’s see if there’s another way to find out who Keen Equities is owned by online.
How To Find Out Who Owns An LLC In New York, Round 2
If there’s a large real estate project, there’s absolutely DEC documents and other property information online.
But it may take some digging on your local town website or googling the project name (in this case, Clovewood) and the name of the LLC. For example with the South Blooming Grove housing development, you can find the draft Environmental Impact Statement online here.
This took some scrolling
.
On that document, I found the following:
Owner: Keen Equities, LLC C/o Y.C. Rubin 4922 11th Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11219
(FYI: The email listed here for Keen Equities is YCR@Windsorglobal.com)
Developer: CPC LLC C/o Simon Gelb PO Box 2020 Monroe, NY 10949 845-774-8000 cpcnynj@gmail.com
And now we have a name to match the address for Keen Equities: Y.C. Rubin 4922 11th Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11219
Ok, So Now What?
Well, Y.C. isn’t very helpful. It’s like how I use B.J.
B.J. isn’t my actual name, it’s just easier for people to say.
So if you find a landlord or real estate owner using their initials, it helps to get the full name.
How?
You google the person’s name you have and the address together. So: “Y.C. Rubin 4922 11th Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11219”
Your results may vary. But in the case of Y.C. Rubin, we’re in luck. There is some legal activity that can be found here.
Thanks to those documents, we now have a full name: Yehoshua Chaim Rubin.
According to RealtyHop, Y.C. Rubin came into possession of 4922 11th Avenue Brooklyn in 2007, when it was transferred to him from Yenty Rubin.
The last step is to go to BeenVerified, put in the name of the person you found, and run a report.
The thing I always look for is the addresses, to confirm that what I found online is accurate, and criminal record search.
It’ll take $30 if you want to see the information they gather, but it’s worth it. (A free alternative you can try is That’sThem, but it won’t tell you if there’s a criminal record for free.)
According to BeenVerified, Mr. Rubin filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy in May of 2023, two months after The Albany Times Union reported that the NYS DEC levied $228,000 fine against Keen Equities LLC. He has also used the following aliases: Sheya Rubin, Yehoshua M Rubin, Yehoshua R Rubin, Yehoshua Rubin, Rubin R Yehoshua, Sheya C Rubin.
Now, we can to to the Attorney General’s complaint form concerning environmental issues. I just filled one out.
You can do so if you’d like. You’ll need the email address, the mailing address, the name of the individual, and any supporting documentation. I included the Albany Times Union article for supporting documentation.
Next year, in 2025, this process should be way easier. But this is how you can find out who owns an LLC for now.