Capital Group Properties Sues A Framingham Widow: Asks Land Court To Force Her To Sell Her Home To Them at Less than Half it's Assessed Value

 

Here in Lancaster, Capital Group Properties is mostly "not doing" things: they're not building "Lancaster Landings" and not paying us the $100K that they promised us.   In Framingham, however,  they've been busy.  This month Bill Depietri sued a recent widow, insisting that their email exchange resulted in a finalized contract.   He now wants the land court to force her to sell him her home --assessed at $773K this year-- to him for $350K.

 
Roseanne Pellegrini lives in Framingham.   Her home is a a 3 bedroom, 2 bath, 2100 square foot residence on an acre on Pleasant Street that she bought with husband, Lee, in 2006.   In August her husband died of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis at 75. 

Five years ago Rosanne and Lee sold a strip of their property to  developers who used it to build two new homes.   Now, looking toward the future on her own, she reached out to those same developers via email on October 7th:

"I'm prompted to approach you because Lee passed away suddenly, and I'm exploring my options in selling our property.  I'd greatly appreciate your getting back to me to let me know whether or not this may be of interest to you as you plan future projects."

 The contact she reached out to -- a project manager at JBL Construction -- responded quickly:

 "I passed your info along to my dad Bill who is the owner of the company.   He will reach out to you this week if you have not already heard from him." 

 If you've lived in Lancaster in the last five years, you may be very familiar with "my dad Bill."  He is  William A. "Bill" Depietri, the president of Capital Group Properties.  Capital Group Properties, Bill DiPietri, and their project corporation "702 LLC" are well known in Lancaster for pitching the "Lancaster Landings" project off Lunenburg Road:  in exchange for re-zoning 100 acres of residential and conservation land for industrial use, they pledged to develop a $200 million industrial, commercial and retail project.   Earlier this year Bill appeared at an Economic Development Committee meeting and admitted it would likely never be constructed as presented.   The project  has since become the local poster child for inadequate regulatory scrutiny and municipal corruption.

In the coming weeks, Rosanne exchanged a series of emails with Bill Depietri.  By the end of October they had hammered out some terms: 

"350,000
  Cash offer
  Close ASAP
  120 Day Remain in house
  No rent
  We pay the taxes
  You pay utilities
  Just leave what you want in the house

  Bill Depietri
  President
  Capital Group Properties" 

Rosanne expressed some disappointment in his offer:  "Would you come closer to $500,000?" but he would not budge.   On November 4th Bill prepared and emailed a formal contract, and Rosanne forwarded it to her attorney for review.

"Thank you Bill,
  For expedience I've copied my attorney, Janice Rogers of Rogers and Rogers in Framingham, on this message so she can also review your draft offer."

That's as close as Bill ever came to a contract with Roseanne.   Maybe her attorney warned her off, maybe she saw a 3rd party appraisal, or maybe she just followed her guy -- because she was going to get hosed.   Framingham assessed her property at $773,200, more than double Bill's highest offer.

 Unfortunately, Bill wasn't going to back off.  

On November 15th,   an attorney for the Capital Group contacted Roseanne, and she told him she had no further interest in selling her property for redevelopment.  Presumably she now knew it was worth a lot more as-is than Bill was letting on: 

On December 2nd, Bill Depietri and Capital Group Properties filed a suit in the Land Court alleging that the two had completed all the necessary elements of a contract via those emails and that the final email on November 4th sealed the deal:

 "26.  Pellegrini's response to Depietri on November 4, 2025 is a complete agreement to all the material terms and conditions previously proposed by Depietri for the purchase of the property, thus rendering the email contract a binding agreement between the parties."  

Bill Depietri is demanding that the court force the widow to sell him her property at less than half it's assessed value:   

"That the Defendant be ordered to specifically perform the email contract and convey the Property to the Plaintiffs in accordance with the agreed upon terms of the email contract."

Does Bill really think the widow agreed to sell him her property in that email?   I think most people would read her November 4th response and realize she didn't feel it was a final agreement:  she repeatedly refers to in as a "draft" and clearly expects to review it with her attorney.  Nothing changed hands to formalize the deal.

 You can read through the docket yourself:  the emails are attached as exhibits to the initial complaint.

•  Access the online dockets here:  https://www.masscourts.org
• Search in the "Land Court Department" for case "25 MISC 000747"

As part of the suit, Bill and the Capital Group filed for a "Lis Pendens" on the property that will cloud the title and prevent Roseanne from selling the property to anyone else while the case is processed.   In my opinion, he's betting that she'll capitulate and sell the property to him for less than its full value.

I can't imagine heaping this financial and emotional burden on a grieving widow at Christmas:  this is repugnant behavior on Capital Group's part.   For all we experienced with them in Lancaster, I think this is far worse.