Hunter Biden paid $50,000 in rent for office space in DC, not to his father to live at Delaware home

Days after it was reported that classified documents were found in President Joe Biden’s office at a Washington, D.C., think tank and at his Delaware home, conservative commentators launched new allegations about him and his son, Hunter Biden.

"Hunter Biden paid his dad $50,000 a MONTH in rent for the home that housed classified documents… During the same time, Joe Biden only claimed less than $20,000 in rent payments PER YEAR!!!" read a Jan 17 Instagram post by Newsmax host Carl Higbie.

"Tucker digs up BOMBSHELL documents proving Hunter Biden RENTED top-secret documents STOLEN by Joe Biden," Donald Trump Jr. posted on Facebook, featuring a post by conservative commentator Benny Johnson alongside a clip of Fox News host Tucker Carlson.

These posts are inaccurate and were flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.

The rumor took off after Carlson ran a segment on Jan. 16 about a newly surfaced background screening document that Hunter Biden purportedly filled out in July 2018 as part of an application for a rental property in California. It appears to contain some errors.

We couldn’t confirm whether it was Hunter Biden who filled out the form on July 27, 2018, but emails shared online by a former Trump White House aide suggest Hunter Biden’s former assistant completed the form for him. The date of an email titled "background app" matches the date the form was signed. It also follows a separate email Hunter Biden appears to have sent inquiring about a rental in California.

No matter who filled it out, the document does not show that Hunter Biden paid his father $50,000 in monthly rent to live at the family’s Wilmington, Delaware, home. 

The figure in question — $49,910 — matches the quarterly rent for office space at the House of Sweden, home to the Swedish and Icelandic embassies on K Street in Washington, D.C. Business records show that an office for Rosemont Seneca Advisors, an investment firm Hunter Biden co-founded, was located there.

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House of Sweden pointed us to a spokesperson for Sweden’s National Property Board, who confirmed to PolitiFact that Hunter Biden paid $49,910 in quarterly rent for an office space in House of Sweden. The spokesperson also confirmed the lease start and end dates, which match the dates on the form. 

New York Post reporter Miranda Devine, who was one of the first to share the document online, made an updated post after rumors surfaced suggesting it showed rental payments to his father. 

"Caution re wild speculation. This was for Hunter Biden’s application for an apartment in a hip Hollywood complex he was desperate to get into," Devine wrote on Twitter. "Big-noting by falsely claiming to own dad’s house in DE. The rent may refer to the $50k rent he paid for his office at House of Sweden."

Conservative commentators and social media posts claim that Hunter Biden paid Joe Biden $50,000 in monthly rent to live at the same Delaware home where classified documents were found.

This is wrong. The figure refers to quarterly rent Hunter Biden paid for office space in Washington, D.C., a spokesperson for Sweden’s National Property Board confirmed.

We rate this claim False.

PolitiFact researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report. 

Update, Jan. 23, 2023: This story has been updated to include confirmation from Sweden’s National Property Board on the lease dates for Hunter Biden's business.