By Marisa Taylor, Chris Prentice and Mike Colias
BLOOMFIELD TOWNSHIP, Michigan (Reuters) -Close relatives of the federal official who has accused a Federal Reserve governor of improperly claiming primary residence on two properties have declared the same status on two homes in two different states, public records show.
Mark and Julie Pulte, the father and stepmother of Bill Pulte, President Donald Trump’s appointee as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, since 2020 have claimed so-called “homestead exemptions” for residences in wealthy neighborhoods in both Michigan and Florida, according to the records. The exemption is meant to give a discount to homeowners on taxes for properties they use as their primary residence.
Local tax officials in both states told Reuters that claiming more than one home as a primary residence isn’t generally allowed in their jurisdictions and could be punishable by fines or back taxes. After Reuters contacted tax officials in Bloomfield Township, Michigan, to inquire about the dual claims, Darrin Kraatz, director of assessing, on Thursday said the township “as of today” would revoke the exemption on the Pultes’ residence there.
According to public real estate records, and a resident at the Michigan house on Thursday evening, the home was rented out by the Pultes this year, a move that also violates rules for the exemption. “Revised tax bills will be issued to the Pultes, including all applicable penalty and interest,” Kraatz said by email. He didn’t respond to a follow-up question about the value of any payment now due and Reuters couldn’t determine a precise figure for previous tax payments they have made.
Officials in Florida, citing the claim for exemption in that state as older, said any conflict with the second exemption would need to be addressed in Michigan.
Reuters was unable to reach Mark or Julie Pulte for comment. Representatives at Mark Pulte’s business and a Pulte family foundation didn’t respond to phone calls or emails seeking comment for this story.
Officials at the FHFA, the federal agency led by Bill Pulte, didn’t respond to a request for comment. The news agency was unable to reach him otherwise.
The claim of more than one property as a primary residence has been the basis for Bill Pulte’s accusations against Lisa Cook, the Federal Reserve governor Trump fired as a result and who has since filed suit against the president to fight the dismissal. Pulte referred the matter to the attorney general, prompting a probe of Cook by the Justice Department.
In addition to that formal action against Cook, Pulte in recent days has made multiple public statements against her, accusing her of defrauding mortgage lenders and the public. “Financial fraud is a big deal,” Pulte wrote last weekend on X, the social media site, to his three million followers. “Don’t do it!”
He also criticized Cook after learning she rented out one of the homes that she had declared as a primary residence. “Lisa Cook’s declared ‘PRIMARY RESIDENCE’ is being RENTED out to tenants,” he wrote in another X post.
Cook has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. “How Governor Cook described her properties,” her attorney wrote in a statement on Thursday, is “not fraud.”
In the garage of the Michigan house, on a quiet cul-de-sac with wood-shingled homes and manicured yards, a man told Reuters that he lives at the property as a tenant and doesn’t know the name of the homeowner. He declined to be identified by name or say through whom or how long he has been renting the property.
“THEY GOT LUCKY”
The Pulte family, which rose to prominence with a housing empire started in Michigan by Mark Pulte’s father, is active in conservative circles. Both Mark and his wife, electoral records show, have made multiple campaign contributions to Republican candidates and causes.
In addition to founding his own housing company in Florida, where he has specialized in building luxury properties, Mark Pulte is a senior official at a Pulte family foundation. His high-profile real estate activities have included the 2021 sale of a property for $122.7 million, a record for Palm Beach at the time. Years earlier, the property had been among Trump’s Florida holdings.
In his comments to Senate officials for his confirmation as director of the federal housing agency, Bill Pulte thanked his father and stepmother for their support. He said he grew up visiting construction sites of homes built by his father and grandfather. In past public statements he has said that Mark helped finance Pulte Capital Partners, the Florida-based private equity firm Bill founded.
The homestead exemptions claimed by Mark and Julie Pulte, eight tax and real estate experts told Reuters, would typically be permissible only in a rare exception that can be made for a couple in which spouses are conducting entirely independent lives – living separately at the two addresses, separating their finances and filing their taxes individually. Reuters couldn’t determine whether the Pultes qualified for such an exemption or had used such grounds to justify their homestead claims.
“It’s not something that either state generally lets you get away with,” said Lisa Bender, a longtime real estate agent in both Michigan and Florida. Bender said she personally knows the ins-and-outs of the homestead exemptions because she also owns properties in both states. “I wish I could claim both,” she said. “Somehow they got lucky.”
No mortgage records exist for the Michigan and Florida properties, which suggests the Pultes likely paid for the homes in cash, real estate experts said. By paying lower taxes on both homes, they added, the couple is contributing less than they otherwise would to public coffers, including funding for area schools.
On properties like those owned by the Pultes, the exemptions can add up to thousands of dollars in savings each year. On the Florida home, in Boca Raton, the exemption saved the Pultes an estimated $158,000 in taxes for 2025, according to officials with the tax assessor’s office in Palm Beach County, the property tax jurisdiction. The county granted an additional exemption on the property because the house – a waterfront home with marble floors, in-ground pool, and a boat dock – surpasses a certain value threshold, the records indicate.
The Pultes bought the Boca Raton house in 2016 for $4.25 million and later transferred the title to a legal entity in which they are both listed as beneficiaries, the records show. Mark Pulte filed the exemption request.
On the Michigan property, listed as a four-bedroom home with sauna and purchased for nearly $1 million in 2020, both spouses are named on a trust that owns the house. Julie Pulte claimed the exemption there.
When contacted by Reuters about the dual exemptions, Nery Mejia, an exemptions manager for the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser’s Office, said the office would look into it. In a follow-up by email, she said the paperwork in Florida is valid and predates the Michigan claim. “Based on this,” she wrote, “the matter should be handled by Michigan.”
It isn’t clear how much the Pultes may have saved each year because of the Michigan claim, but on Friday property records already indicated the exemption there is now zero.
(Editing by Paulo Prada.)
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