Paying with cash doesn’t usually raise any eyebrows but when a millionaire never uses a credit card, it raises many questions. Anna Delvey was a German heiress who went from city to city, spending money freely as she pleased.
But it seemed like there was a particular reason no one ever saw Anna swipe a credit card with her name on it. Read on to discover the amazing life of Anna Delvey, the world’s only millionaire who didn’t have a penny to her name.
Who Was She?
Anna Delvey was known in the high society of Europe. She appeared in every high-profile event across the continent and seemed to know everyone who was anyone and just by looking at Anna, you could tell she came from money.
She lived the carefree life of an heiress, where she did whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted to. With no permanent address. Anna was simply going from hotel to hotel, country to county. Her favourite was the Soho Boutique Hotel at 11 Howard Street, where she quickly gained quite a reputation.
Living The Life
No one questioned when Anna Delvey, didn’t pay for her stay with a credit card as was usual for most people but it was easily ignored since she made it a habit to tip hotel staff, $100 every time she saw them. “People were fighting to carry their packages upstairs, you fought because you knew you would get $ 100.” says the hotel manager.
Clearly, she came from considerable wealth and didn’t need a credit card like most people. On top that, she was always dressed impeccably, wearing luxurious designer clothes every day. She also quickly became friends with the manager in Howard 11, a young woman named Neffatari Davis, known as Neff.
A Woman in Soho
For Neff Davis, Anna Delvey seemed to fit the classic profile of someone from high society in Soho and someone she should get as close to as possible. Neff was a budding filmmaker and Anna’s connections could only help advance her career.
Anna would go downstairs to ask for recommendations for places to eat or go, but it soon became apparent that Anna already knew the best places to go. So why was she trying to always chat up Neff? It seemed like Anna didn’t want information but a friend.
Celebrity Friends
Aside from becoming friends with Neff Davis, Anna took it upon herself to organize huge dinners at Le Coucou, a nearby expensive French restaurant. The events were incredibly star-studded, attended by CEOs, artists, athletes, and even celebrities.
Neff was obviously invited to attend the dinners and one night she even found herself sitting next to Macaulay Culkin, an experience she described as uncomfortable. “I had so many questions. And he was right there. But they were talking like friends stuff. So I never had a chance to ask questions like, ‘So, are you the godfather of Michael Jackson’s children?'”
The Charismatic Anna
In just a short amount of time, Anna has made herself at home an elite circle of friends, she was often described as a sweet and polite girl who just showed up out of nowhere and was great at making conversation.
According to those who knew Anna, “She managed to be in all kinds of right places.” One day she would appear at a party in Berlin on a private plane wearing the most expensive clothes and the next, at Paris Fashion Week.
Meeting Michael Xufu Huang
Anna seemed to be living the perfect life but when she met Michael Xufu Huang, a successful art collector and museum founder the seeds of her true nature were sown and would destroy her.
The two immediately bonded and decided to take a trip to Italy to celebrate the Venice Biennale together. Anna asked Michael to put the flight and her hotel stay on his credit card, which he found “a little weird.”
Venice
While they were in Italy, Michael was another person who thought it strange that Anna paid for everything in cash. This with her recent request to use his credit card for this flights and hotel room was feeling odd to him.
Anna had assured Micheal that she would reimburse him for his credit card use and when Micheal asked for her to do just that, it seemed like Anna had forgotten ” all her money” back in Soho. While, this might be a huge red flag for most people, in the world of millionaires, a friend owing you a few thousand dollars was no big deal, and soon Micheal forgot all about it.
Her Birthday Party
For Anna’s birthday, she decided to go all out as it was expected of her to do and threw a big blowout. She hired a public relations agency to organize everything and told them to make sure there were a lot of successful people in attendance.
The party was a success and everything went all it was planned. It was only after a couple of days when Michael got a message asking for Anna Delvey’s contact information because she “didn’t pay the bill.”
No One Really Knew Her
Anna’s stream of money was getting more and more suspicious, day by day. News started spreading of Anna’s inability to pay for her party and everyone had a different explanation for her source of income.
Some stated that Anna Delvey’s father was a Russian diplomat and that she had “family money.” Another was told that her father was a stakeholder in the oil industry. With each story different from the next, rumours began circulating about Anna’s history.
Next Project
Anna herself seemed not to be bothered by speculation. In fact, on the contrary. The more people wondered who she was and where she came from, the more people wanted to be her friend.
Rather than focus on gossip, Delvey was busy establishing an exclusive club that featured art called the Anna Delvey Foundation, or FAD. She even hired a London creative director, Marc Kremers, to help her with the branding of her new location.
Need A Bank
To secure the location she would need to get a loan from a bank since it caused multi-millions! Anna’s financial partner, who was helping her purchase the location, wrote in an email that she needed the loan because “her personal resources, which are substantial, are located outside of the United States”
She promised that she had the resources to pay the money back and also vowed not to embarrass the agency in any way, since her reputation of being unable to pay her debts was becoming quite well-known.
Getting The Funds
To get her project kickstarted, Anna decided to host a fundraiser and invited all her wealthy contacts. One of the guests included the notorious “pharma bro,” Martin Shkreli, the man who got gunned down when his company raised the price of a critical drug from $13 to $750. He was later found guilty of security fraud and is currently in prison.
“Anna seemed to be a popular ‘city woman’ who knew everyone,” Shkreli wrote. “Even though I was nationally known, I felt like a computer geek next to her.” Anna also learned a few tricks from Shkreli, tricks that she would later use to get revenge.
The Begining Of The End
Despite, many rumours breaking down Anna’s reputation, she was more focused on opening her foundation. “I was always on the phone with lawyers,” said Neff, who was listening in on conversations at the hotel. “They were always toning her down. Like, ‘Anna, you’re trying to make something worth this worth that, and it doesn’t work that way.’ ”
Then one night Anna invited Neff to one of her extravagant dinners and when it came to paying the hefty bill, it was clear Anna was having cash problems. She even tried to pay with around 12 different credit cards and yes, all were rejected.
Hotel Bill
It was obvious that Anna Delvey wasn’t just having some minor cash flow problems, she needed to pay thousands in outstanding bills. Her biggest was for her stay at Howard 11. In fact, they didn’t even have a credit card on file for her.
Still, the hotel had been treating Delvey as a valued guest as she was a German heiress and a client of the hotel owner (the owner also owned the location she was trying to purchase) so the hotel agreed to accept a transfer as payment. But after a month and a half, there was still no payment made and Anna owed the hotel about $30,000.
One Step Forward, Two Steps Back
Just as things were getting escalated and even Neff was starting to worry about her “heiress” friends finances, a bank transfer was made to the hotel in Anna Delvey’s name of $30,000.
It seemed like Anna did have the money to cover her stay and both Neff and hotel breathed a sigh of relief but even though the big chunk of her bill had been paid, she still had daily bills for room service etc. With no credit card to put these payments through the hotel insisted that it was time for Anna to give them a valid credit card or they would have to change her room door code.
Escalating Issues
Most people in this situation would have provided a credit card, especially when threatened in such a manner but Anna never bothered to follow the hotel’s warnings and one morning, true to their word her room code was changed, leaving her stranded outside.
Delvey was furious, she couldn’t believe they were treating her like ” everyone else” but her tantrum was falling on deaf ears until she remembered a trick her friend, Martin Shkreli had taught her. She told the hotel managers that she would buy web domains in her name so they would have to pay her one day to get them.
Running Away From Her Problems
In the middle of all of this, Anna decided it was the best time to go on vacation to Morocco with her personal trainer and a videographer named Rachel Williams. The trip was meant to be a relaxing getaway but was also fraught with problems.
Ana’s personal trainer had a bad stomach bug and returned to the United States before the vacation ended. A couple of days later, she got a hysterical call from Anna. According to Anna, her credit card did not pass. She begged her personal trainer to let her use her credit card and she would pay for it later. Sounds familiar right?
Nowhere To Go
When Anna returned to the United States, she moved to another hotel. But the same problem occurred again. She couldn’t provide a valid credit card to pay off her $11,518 debt, so they eventually kicked her out and confiscated her belongings.
Now Anna was on the streets of New York. Once a part of high society, now homeless. She applied her hotel strategy one more time but only got away with it for a few days before she was kicked out again! She turned again to her personal trainer to let her spend the night at her house making vague suicide threats.
New Home
Anna’s personal trainer still hadn’t received the $62,000 charge on her American Express card which she had made to pay for Anna’s vacation to Morocco and now with Anna not even being able to spend a night in a hotel, it was looking like she was not going to be getting her money back.
Allowing her to spend the night over, she asked Anna to leave her home but Anna refused to leave! Things were starting to get out of hand after much debating her fitness instructor finally got Anna to leave her apartment but all Anna did was stay outside in the hallway, begging to let back in!
Scamming Her Friends
It turns out that Anna’s personal trainer wasn’t the first person she had asked to stay with, she had also called her lawyer who had refused. After witnessing Ann’a hysterics in her hallway, her personal trainer decided to contact her lawyer and they decided that things had to be taken a step further.
They planned to host an intervention for Anna and ask her about the tens of thousands of dollars she has scammed from her so-called friends and colleagues. Anna started crying at one point, saying that she would have enough money to pay everyone after she had her rent signed.
Public Knowledge
The money troubles of Anna Delvey soon turned from gossip to newspaper headlines, most calling her a “high society wannabe.” Anna didn’t take the news very well. She would cry on calls, assuring that everything they were saying about her was a lie.
Even after being unable to pay her debts, she was still sticking to the same story that she had the money and that things had just taken a wrong turn. By the end of the intervention, no one was convinced.
The First Arrest
Despite, Anna’s stubbornness and insistence that she was “very well-off” she was arrested for her outstanding hotel bills but Anna didn’t face any consequences because her lawyer got her released on bail.
From there she went back to business as usual. Somehow she begged and borrowed money to make a trip to California, where she was re-arrested in Malibu. She was forced to return to New York.
Harsher Punishment
This time Anna was sent to Rikers Island Jail without bond. She is currently waiting to go to court and faces possibly 15 years in prison. Turns out, she wasn’t a German heiress after all. Her real name was Anna Sorokin and she was born in Russia in 1991.
She came from a middle-class family. All her stories fabricated in an attempt to live a life she couldn’t afford but even after being caught, Anna’s lawyer was still trying to persuade the judge not to have her pay for her crimes. He offered the judge a sentence reduction agreement for just one to three years in prison. An offer that was strongly rejected by the ruling judge.
The appeal
The judge offered her a counteroffer for three to nine years at most. Anna “Delvey” Sorokin rejected the offer, choosing to go to court instead. Of course, going to court fit Anna’s dramatic personality and delusions schemes of grandeur.
According to the judge in court, Justice Diane Kiesel, Anna showed to be “unapologetic” for her actions. Kiesel also stated that Anna’s sentence reduction agreement from one to three years in prison was nothing more than a minor reprimand.
A Criminal Celebrity
Anna is currently waiting to go to court and while she waits, popular streaming service Netflix is in discussions about making a series about her life. One of the judges in the case has said that Anna is more concerned about who will play her role on the show than about her crimes.
“Actually, this place isn’t that bad,” Anna said of being imprisoned at Rikers. “People think it’s horrible, but I see it as a sociological experiment.” Even her lawyer said that Anna seems to be doing very well in prison.
Right At Home
According to Anna attorney, “She’s like a unicorn there.” He has reported that she made many friends in prison and sees her fellow inmates, in there for being killers as the most fascinating residents and spends most of her time, studying the residents around her.
“This girl has been stealing other people’s identities. I didn’t know it was that easy, ”said Anna fascinated, which leaves many people wondering if she is enjoying her time behind bars just to learn more tricks of the trade?
Her Total Debt
Experts in the case believe that Anna Sorokin allegedly scammed people and multiple banks and hotels of around $275,000. She allegedly used forged documents to acquire loans from banks. Those documents showed that she had millions of dollars in banks in Europe.
She also reserved bad checks between banks and took lines of credit that she had no way to pay. Maybe she planned to pay for it all after her business was a hit but of course, now that she is in prison that looks to be far from happening.