The suit, filed by a unit of Perelman’s MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings Inc., claims that a company owned by Rennert borrowed millions of dollars with overly favorable terms from a business set up as part of a deal for truck maker AM General. Perelman's company bought a majority stake in AM General in 2004.
The lawsuit claims that Rennert’s company has borrowed a total of $109 million from Ilshar Capital LLC since 2009. Rennert’s company used Ilshar as a “a convenient drive-thru teller to which they pull up and ask themselves for as much money as they like,” according to the suit.
The suit claims the loans are unsecured and require no payment until the fifth year.
Rennert has since filed a countersuit claiming Perelman diverted as much as $175 million that should belong to Renco. The suit says that Perelman’s companies also took loans on overly favorable terms.
A spokesperson for Perelman said the Rennert suit is “baseless because our conduct was consistent with the parties’ agreements and their course of conduct for almost 10 years.”
Meanwhile, Rennert is catching heat from neighbors at Fair Field, his 63-acre waterfront estate in Sagaponack in the Hamptons. At more than 43,000 square feet, the home is one of the largest residential compounds in America.
Fair Field caused an uproar in neighborhood when it was built in the late 1990s and inspired a novel called “The House That Ate the Hamptons.”
According to an article in Mother Jones, Rennert often travels to and from Fair Field on a Sikorsky S-92, a helicopter usually used to carry a dozen or more passengers.