Michael O'Sullivan ran a company called Hampton Dream Properties. The name sold the pitch. The paperwork, according to civil filings and a Curbed investigation published in 2025, sold very little else.
Clients paid deposits — in some cases tens of thousands of dollars — on Hamptons-area residential listings that O'Sullivan marketed as available for purchase. They signed contracts. They waited. In multiple instances, according to the reporting, the properties were not his to sell.
No deeds transferred. No deposits returned. The buyers were left with signed agreements and a disconnected phone number.
O'Sullivan's operation moved through the high-demand Long Island luxury corridor — the stretch of Suffolk County where a modest listing clears seven figures and a legitimate broker's rolodex is worth protecting. He was not, according to the filings reviewed by Curbed, a licensed real estate broker in New York State at the time of several transactions.
The scheme, as described in the record, was not elaborate. It was a man with a company name, a listing sheet, and a deposit line.
At least one victim told Curbed the transaction felt routine right up until it wasn't. The contract looked standard. The escrow instructions looked standard. The address was real. The house was real. The seller's authority to transfer it was not.
Hampton Dream Properties no longer appears to maintain an active web presence. The dream, per the filing, had a refund clause that was never honored.