Kanye West’s financial troubles have apparently become even more dire as his tax bills have reportedly surpassed $1 million.
The rapper now owes additional property taxes on a Wyoming ranch, according to the US Sun.
According to Park Country records viewed by the publication, West’s firm, Psalm Cody Ranch LLC, was due to make two payments of $2,780.33 and $2,966.66 in property taxes on his Monster Lake Ranch in Cody, Wyoming, in May of this year, but has so far failed to pay the taxes.
West, whose ex Amber Rose gave a controversial speech at the Republican National Convention this week, bought the ranch for $14 million and had it for sale for the past three years before recently selling it.
Those sums add up to a mountain of debt, including four tax liens on Yeezy Apparel totaling $934,033.
Kanye West’s unpaid tax debt has reportedly surpassed $1 million, the US Sun reported Tuesday. He reportedly owes additional property taxes on a Wyoming ranch; pictured in March in Los Angeles
The 47-year-old rapper’s properties are also reportedly hit with multiple tax liens, including $101,093 in liens on two of his Los Angeles properties.
A legal source who spoke to the US Sun about West’s legal entanglements claimed that he could use his lack of payment as a way to establish “control” over both his employees and those trying to extract funds from him.
In early July, it was reported that West’s attorney, Brian Brumfield, had dropped him as a client and withdrawn from two lawsuits in which he had been representing the rapper, according to court documents.
He claimed in the filing that West “does not speak to attorneys” and “refuses to pay them as well.”
The legal insider said that “dealing with him in a lawsuit is impossible” as “there is no engagement or reasonable behavior from him or his attorneys, who barely take instructions from him, so just go ahead with the lawsuit and keep billing him.”
“After dealing with his team for years, they like to maintain unpredictable control; money doesn’t seem to be the top priority, but rather making the other party sweat,” they continued. “It’s like giving the middle finger to the courts and showing that this lawsuit means absolutely nothing to Kanye.
“This makes any legal action protracted and difficult,” the source added.
While not paying his bills may be a strategy the former singer uses, it is unclear how much of his fortune, once valued at more than $1 billion, still remains.
Much of that money was tied up in stocks and business deals that disappeared after companies like Adidas fired him in the wake of West’s repeated anti-Semitic remarks.
Adidas stopped selling its lucrative Yeezy shoes amid controversy, and now there appears to be trouble at its Yeezy fashion company.
According to Park Country records viewed by the publication, West’s firm, Psalm Cody Ranch LLC, owed two payments of $2,780 and $2,966 in property taxes on his Monster Lake Ranch in Cody, Wyoming, in May of this year; photographed in February in Milan.
He also allegedly has four tax liens on Yeezy Apparel worth $934,033, as well as $101,093 in liens on two of his Los Angeles properties; photographed in February in Los Angeles.
Adding to his financial troubles is chaos at Yeezy. After opening Yeezy.com and slashing prices on his clothing to $20 across the board, the site is now blank and says it is not accepting new orders.
Earlier this year, all items sold by the fashion house were discounted, sometimes by a steep $20 markdown.
And now the Yeezy website is simply blank, save for a small batch of text that reads: ‘YZY IS NO LONGER ACCEPTING ONLINE PURCHASES UNTIL ALL EXISTING ORDERS ARE COMPLETED.’
He adds that there are ‘2,500 REMAINING ORDERS’ as of July 16.
The site was flooded with orders after West featured it in a Super Bowl ad and advertised the $20 price tag, including items originally sold on his website for hundreds of dollars.
He said in a subsequent social media post that the site has seen $19.3 million in sales thanks to the increased activity.
The site reportedly earned $70 million in the first quarter of 2024, according to the US Sun.
While the site’s closure is believed to be a temporary measure, the lack of products for sale will still cost the Monster rapper millions in lost revenue.
The chaos on the site seems to reflect the disorganization behind the scenes at Yeezy.
West reportedly originally hired designers and other creative talent on a contract basis, primarily from Los Angeles, but amid his controversies in recent years has begun hiring primarily freelancers, many of whom are based in the UK.
She has reportedly hired designers from London-based fashion label Mowalola, although they continue to work for their original employers with her apparent blessing.
The label’s namesake, Mowalola Ogunlesi, was previously the designer of Gap’s disastrous Yeezy line but left to start her own company, though she continued to design some of West’s wife Bianca Censori’s outrageous outfits.
West has also shifted from hiring Los Angeles-based designers on a contract basis to hiring freelancers based in the U.K. and has focused on bringing in students and interns; photographed June 9 in Narita, Japan.
West’s designers include freelancers working for London-based fashion label Mowalola. Designer Mowalola Ogunlesi previously ran Yeezy Gap and went on to design Bianca Censori’s outfits after founding her own label. West and Censori in Milan in February
She has credited West with helping make the 2023 London fashion show possible through his funding.
According to the US Sun, at least six Mowalola designers also freelance for Yeezy.
West is also reportedly looking for designers with few qualifications. He is said to accept students, interns and early-career designers with little experience to work at Yeezy.
Her fashion company has even begun advertising for designers on Craigslist and other social media sites, rather than working through standard industry channels.
