A dozen boxes left behind by a husband-and-wife sales team are the latest point of contention in the lawsuit between Properties of The Villages and former sales representatives who’ve gone rogue.
Jason and Angela Kranz announced in an email to their colleagues in December 2019 that they were leaving Properties of The Villages and had joined fellow former top producer Christopher Day in the NextHome KD Premier Realty venture.
Properties of The Villages is suing the breakaway sales representatives, claiming they were still bound by independent contractor agreements that included non-compete clauses. As an April trial date approaches in U.S. District Court in Ocala, The Villages last week brought on attorney John Lauro, a Fox News legal analyst.
However, the defendants are hoping to push the trial back until at least June, due to the Jan. 29 admission by Properties of The Villages that it has a dozen boxes left behind in the office of Jason and Angela Kranz.
An attorney representing the couple has indicated that the boxes might contain documents important to the upcoming trial. And there are questions as to why Properties of The Villages at the 11th hour disclosed that it has the boxes.
Properties of The Villages has put together an index of what materials were found in the boxes. According to the index, the boxes hold Properties of The Villages listing contracts and related real estate transaction documents, marketing materials, maps, business cards, certificates, customer satisfaction surveys, a bottle of wine and promotional materials such as T-shirts and tumblers.
Properties of The Villages attorney Patrick Muldowney said in an email that the boxes had been left in an office the couple was using and shortly after their departure the boxes were moved into a storage room at Properties of The Villages.
“These are your clients’ boxes that they left behind. It was their responsibility – not our client’s – to sort through the boxes and return any proprietary information to Properties of The Villages. But they did not do so. Instead, they intentionally left behind a disorganized mess and made no attempt to have our business records filed in the appropriate place. Clearly, they had no interest in those documents then, and truthfully have no interest in them now,” Muldowney wrote in the email this past Tuesday to attorney Christopher Prater of the Pollard Law Firm.
In a response, Prater pointed out that Properties of The Villages has had possession of the boxes all this time and said Jason and Angela Kranz are not at fault.
“Efforts to shift the blame for your client’s failure to comply with its discovery obligations should stop,” Prater wrote in an email.
KD Premier Realty continues to enjoy success, recently honored with the Diamond Pinnacle Office Award recognizing that the real estate firm was in the top 25 percent of NextHome offices in the country for 2020.
