There is a very real reason as to why some of us say, “There is no retirement and pension plan in Hip Hop.” That reason is because it’s true. A lot of guys who lived out the very definition of “ballin out of control”, are now wishing they hadn’t wasted their money on things that in the long run couldn’t matter. Unfortunately according to The New York Daily News, we’re learning that infamous Hip Hop Mogul and once king of the game, Damon Dash is probably one of them.
According to reports Damon Dash is so deeply in debt that he is claiming in court documents that he faces imminent eviction from a rented mansion in suburban Carmel, N.Y.
That’s not called being so deeply in debt that you can’t survive, that’s called if you don’t have it like that to live in a mansion anymore, then move to what you can afford and make it nice to live in. Downsizing is way better than trying to maintain something you simply can not afford.
Says Dash;
“I am currently several months behind in paying my personal bills,” he wrote Tuesday in the 5-page filing. “For instance, I am currently over $100,000 behind in rent for the only home in which I live and at risk of being evicted.”
Dame, the former musical partner of Jay-Z in the early days of Roc-A-Fella records and the clothing line Rocawear, told a magazine interviewer once that he “ruled a $50 Million empire.” Many have often wondered over the years what had become of his side of the money after he and Jay split in 2004.
A lot of his fortune appears to have been eaten up by lawsuits from landlords, fashion designer Charlotte Ronson and a celebrity bodyguard firm.
Dash says the “Fresh to Death,” business didn’t work out because of;
“poor business decision made by my partners.”
But in more troubling, flat out worrisome news for the one time, big baller, according to his court filing, Dash faces possible criminal prosecution for non-payment of taxes in New Jersey. Court filings showed Dash also owes more than $2 million in taxes to New York state, and he owes federal income taxes as well.
As we have seen in recent days, the Government is not playing around with millionaires of Hip Hop who owe back taxes. They will throw people in jail quicker than you can say, Jay’s your uncle! If we were in Damon’s position, we would be holding a garage sale in the front yard right this very minute!
That is the downside of this game. It lavished untold fortunes on a few individuals for a while in the 90′s and allowed for them to believe that money would always be pouring in. They hired people to watch their money that were often incapable of accounting for those large amounts of money or who ended up stealing from those stars, and the result was a lot of disillusioned men and women who thought their finances were being looked after properly when they were not. Many of those people have faced prosecution for tax evasion or tax fraud as a result.
The New York Daily News article referred to “a September 2011 article that portrayed Dash as still living large, describing his Carmel home as equipped with a full music studio, a pool, hardwood floors and a spectacular view.” Anyone with any knowledge of Hip Hop and how the game works would know, that most people are not really living the way they claim they are. Most rappers make less than a kid who works at Target or Walmart when the actual check rolls in. But they have on the gear and the diamonds in their ears and retro Jordan’s on their feet, so everyone thinks they’re worth much more than their bank accounts reflect. It’s just how it works…or doesn’t work depending on how you look at it.
