From reporter Daniel Grieger, "Matt Onofrio had a remarkable story. Around 2020, fed up with his career as a nurse anesthetist, the now 32-year-old Wisconsin native quit his job to start investing full time in commercial real estate.

He had no experience in the industry, yet in a few short years he'd raked in tens of millions of dollars. He was the everyman who'd made it big — and he made it sound simple.

Handsome, with close-cropped hair and manicured sideburns, Onofrio became a regular in the investing podcast circuit, peppering his speech with self-help tropes and suggestions that "mindset," "massive action," and setting a "vivid vision" were as important as business know-how. His pitch reached everyone from doctors in California to wannabe entrepreneurs in the Midwest.

Even celebrities were dazzled. The mixed-martial-arts star Michael Chandler set up a video call with Onofrio in 2021. The 37-year-old, who has a wife and two kids, knew he couldn't stay in the ring forever and wanted to replicate Onofrio's success for himself.

In the meeting, Onofrio went out of his way to impress Chandler. He mentioned a book deal with the investing media company BiggerPockets and at one point held up his phone to show that his bank account contained about $35 million. By the end of the year, Chandler was sitting at a closing table in Sauk Rapids, Minnesota, where Onofrio had persuaded him to buy a $16 million commercial property that housed a rehab facility.

But as Chandler scrutinized the paperwork, he realized the deal was more complicated than Onofrio had let on. Onofrio had arranged to buy the property himself months earlier for $12 million. Now he was transferring the contract to Chandler, charging him a $4 million markup. "Michael didn't expect Matt was setting up this deal out of the goodness of his heart," Chandler's attorney, Brendan Johnson, said. "But he certainly didn't appreciate that there would be a $4 million swing."

The property's rental income was just enough to cover its debt and produce modest proceeds, so Chandler put aside his misgivings and signed. Then, in November 2022, federal prosecutors indicted Onofrio on charges involving three deals he'd arranged in Minnesota the year before. It's common practice in real estate to buy a property and flip it to a buyer for a higher price. But the indictment accuses Onofrio of going further. Onofrio, it states, created fake purchase agreements to make his inflated prices seem legitimate to banks, temporarily wired his clients money to dupe banks into lending to them, and lent his clients part of the properties' purchase prices — that they paid him back with interest — without telling the banks.

All of this, the indictment states, amounted to bank fraud. As part of the case, the government froze Onofrio's bank account. No trial date has been set, and Onofrio has yet to enter a plea. Onofrio's attorneys said they "preferred not to comment at this time."

Chandler was shocked to learn that Onofrio, whom he called one of the most "unassuming" people he'd ever met, was an accused fraudster. Onofrio seemed so benign, so completely ordinary, that Chandler had never thought to question him.

The months of shame, uncertainty, and regret have been "the most horrific thing I've ever had to go through in my entire life," said Chandler, who's worried the property will end up being a financial drain. "And I've gone through a lot of tough stuff."

The federal complaint doesn't involve the property Onofrio sold to Chandler. Yet there are striking similarities between Chandler's deal and those described in the indictment, as well as other transactions Onofrio arranged, more than 60 of which are detailed in a spreadsheet given to Insider by a former employee at Onofrio's company, Wild Moose Ventures. That employee, who worked with Onofrio in 2021 and 2022, said he was speaking with law enforcement about Onofrio's conduct and didn't want to be identified. He estimated that Onofrio had set up about $400 million in deals in the two years preceding the charges against him. Finance & Commerce reported that one property was sold three times in four months by Onofrio or entities he controlled, netting Onofrio nearly $4 million in the process.

The unfolding situation has the potential to cast Onofrio as a real-estate confidence man for the influencer age. People have always sought out sources of passive income — ways to make money with minimal work. But the COVID-19 pandemic made the concept irresistible to anyone unemployed or worried about losing their job. Many of these people turned to DIY investing forums, podcasts, and YouTubers for advice. And there was Onofrio, confident and savvy, promising to help average people buy commercial buildings with no money down and no experience — an unheard-of proposition.

Matthew Hermann, a 36-year-old radiologist who bought a warehouse from Onofrio for $6.3 million in 2020, said Onofrio positioned himself as a mentor and safety net, telling him, "I always would look out for you, and if ever push came to shove, I would help you get out of this deal." Hermann said Onofrio wound up overcharging him by $1.5 million and downplaying tens of thousands of dollars in property expenses that Hermann later had to pay. The radiologist estimated he's lost $200,000 so far.

'Matt checked all the right boxes,' said a real-estate investor who hosted Onofrio on his podcast in April 2021. 'It's easy to be a wolf in sheep's clothing. If you present yourself the right way, how are most people supposed to know?' "