Two-thirds of a real estate investment firm in Boulder has left and sued its owner for back pay and commissions after he allegedly cut them out of a $108 million deal.
Founded in 2016 by Ryan Potvin, RMP Investments bought the Sylvia Mae building in Cap Hill for $4.3 million in 2018, then acquired the 64-unit Prospect on Central in LoHi for $34 million in 2021 and the $16 million Belle on the Park near Cheesman in 2022. It converted the latter from age- and income-restricted to unrestricted apartments, according to its website.
Peter Kling of Basalt says he was hired by Potvin at the start of 2025 and paid $100 per hour to be RMP’s implementation manager, a role that was to begin as part-time but eventually grow to a $240,000-per-year full-time job. It never did.
“Kling’s services included … managing the transition of three Denver-area properties from one property management company to a successor property management company after Cornerstone Apartments terminated its relationship with RMP — an operational crisis that RMP was unprepared to navigate,” according to Kling’s July 16 lawsuit.
Kling says he has not received $114,000 in back pay from RMP and Potvin, its sole owner.
“RMP had ample resources to pay Kling but chose not to,” he alleges.
Much like a second lawsuit also filed July 16, Kling’s suit spends considerable time discussing Ridge45, a 500-unit apartment complex in Traverse City, Michigan, that RMP bought for $108 million. Kling claims he devised the strategy that won RMP the property, entitling him to $323,750 in commissions.
But lawyers for RMP have informed him he is entitled to nothing, according to Kling, since he resigned from the company before the sale closed this month. In fact, he was overpaid while at RMP and owes the firm a refund of $12,000, Kling reportedly has been told.
Potvin did not respond to BusinessDen’s requests for comment about Kling’s lawsuit and that of Sam Maddox, who came to know Potvin through an investment club and was hired as RMP’s head of acquisitions last summer. He was reportedly to be paid $3,000 per month.
Maddox says he also worked closely on the Ridge45 deal for six months and was promised at least $135,000 from its purchase. Maddox parted ways with RMP on March 17, one week after Kling is said to have resigned because he was not being paid. Maddox is suing for $143,000.
Kling’s lawyer is Jeffrey Glotzer with Frascona, Joiner, Goodman and Greenstein in Boulder. Maddox’s attorney is Jordan Porter, a sole practitioner in Denver.
