Minnesota regulators sue fake home-repair firm

Home-repair scams usually look small — one bad contractor, one fake invoice, one job that never gets finished. But this case is bigger and weirder than that. Minnesota regulators say an Illinois company built a whole fake local-business universe online, then used it to catch homeowners who thought they were hiring someone nearby. This week, Attorney General Keith Ellison sued B.E.S.T. GDR LLC, which does business as Premium Home Service, and its owner, Yosef Bernath. ### What are regulators saying the company actually did? The basic claim is simple: Premium Home Service allegedly made up hundreds of local home-repair companies in Minnesota, and thousands more around the country, then gave those fake businesses local-looking addresses, local phone numbers, and strong ratings so they would show up like real neighborhood contractors in search results. The Minnesota complaint says many of the company names were invented, the addresses were fake or belonged to unrelated people, and the reviews were fabricated. (ag.state.mn.us) ### Why would that work on homeowners? Because people shopping for a plumber, electrician, or garage-door repair usually make a snap decision. They search for a nearby business, see a map pin, see a few five-star reviews, and call. Regulators say that was the whole trick here — make the listing look local and trustworthy, then intercept the call before a real local business gets it. The FTC says those listings used common search terms like plumbing, HVAC, electrical work, and garage-door repair to siphon off demand. (ag.state.mn.us) ### Who answered when people called? Not the local company on the screen — because regulators say there was no local company. The Minnesota complaint says calls were routed to customer-service representatives, often overseas, who kept up the local-business story and tried to sell either a membership plan or a one-time service call. After that, the work was typically outsourced to subcontractors. In other words, the company allegedly acted as a hidden middleman while pretending to be the contractor itself. (ftc.gov) ### What’s the harm if someone still got service? The catch is that the deception is the product. Homeowners thought they were choosing a nearby small business with a real storefront and local reputation. Regulators say they were instead funneled into a broker network they never knowingly chose. Minnesota’s complaint says consumers reported feeling tricked and said they would not have bought the service if they had known the truth. It also says some subcontracted providers were unqualified or did poor work. (ag.state.mn.us) ### How big does Minnesota think this got? Big enough that the state is talking about thousands of consumers and millions of dollars. The complaint says that between June 2020 and May 2023, the defendants tricked thousands of Minnesota consumers into buying services and memberships, taking millions of dollars from people who believed they were supporting local businesses. The state also says the conduct continued through 2024 and, it believes, beyond that. (ag.state.mn.us) ### Is this just a Minnesota case? No — and that’s what makes it land harder. Minnesota filed its own case, but the FTC and the state of Illinois also sued Premium Home Service and Bernath on May 11, 2026, describing a nationwide system of fake listings and fake reviews. Federal regulators say the company had been operating this way since at least 2018. So this is not just one state chasing one bad listing — it’s multiple governments trying to shut down a business model. (ag.state.mn.us) ### What are regulators trying to get now? They want the scheme stopped and consumers repaid if the court agrees. Minnesota says the lawsuit is meant to end the deceptive practices and get relief for harmed consumers. The FTC and Illinois are also seeking to halt the conduct. So the immediate stakes are injunctions, money, and whether courts treat fake local-business ecosystems as a major consumer-fraud problem rather than just shady marketing. (ftc.gov) ### Bottom line This case is about search results as much as home repair. Regulators are saying the company didn’t just mislead people after contact — it allegedly built the fake storefront that got the click in the first place. If that theory holds up, this becomes a warning for anyone hiring urgent help online: the “local company” on the screen may not exist at all. (ag.state.mn.us)