The road to Brasov
The villa at the end of Strada Narciselor is at the end of a dangerous road surrounded by the fir-covered peaks of the Carpathians.
Andrew Tate’s first Romanian address is a far cry from the glitzy lifestyle he displayed in Bucharest before his arrest – it’s a squat three-storey building with yellow walls a short drive from the village of Sacele.
The long drive from Bucharest winds for miles through a snow-covered forest, tree branches covered in ice to the tips, mountains dipping to the horizon – it’s like driving through a Christmas card.
Outside Sacele, the icy track narrows to the width of a car as it climbs towards the villa, a steep slope on one side.
No Ferrari here. A Dacia and a Skoda are parked between muddy snowdrifts in front of the building.
Inside, it is divided into small functional apartments. It was here, in apartments 9 and 17, that the Tate brothers began to build their Romanian business empire.
Vasile Mezdrea, a local developer, sold the lots to them “in 2015 or early 2016” for less than €35,000 ($37,900; £31,425) each.
“They paid in installments because they didn’t have the money to buy the apartments directly,” he told me. “They didn’t have cars back then – they took taxis with their friends to go shopping.”
He says Andrew moved here with a British friend, Melissa, who bought a third flat in the same block.
But she was not the only woman living here with the brothers, according to locals. Several people told us that other women lived in their homes or visited them regularly.
One, who asked not to be named, said he had received complaints that naked women were clearly visible in the Tates’ ground floor apartment.
The building in the Romanian countryside where the Tate brothers founded their Romanian business empire
Few people in the block remember the Tates. And those who do not want to speak officially.
“They were contemptuous, arrogant,” said one. But “very low key – there was no music, no fighting”.
She said her dog, a German Shepherd, was released to roam the building, at one point attacking one of the residents, leaving her with bruises.
The complaints addressed to the brothers would have gone unanswered.
Seven years later, the brothers are worth millions with a Bucharest lifestyle of designer watches, private jets and an extensive real estate portfolio.
In Sacele itself, with its post office, pizzeria and slot machines, the Tates are best known for their recent return visits – their flashy new cars were a must.
Vasile Mezdrea says they moved to Romania because there are “beautiful women there and life is cheaper”.
But he says the brothers had ambitions that went beyond Sacele. “They always wanted more,” he told me.
Andrew Tate (left) and his brother Tristan (right) appeared in a Bucharest court last week
Sacele may seem like an unlikely starting point for the two young British kickboxers, but it reveals a connection to two people who will play key roles in their lives.
One is a businessman named Sebastian Vieru, who brought the Tate brothers to Romania in 2014.
Mr. Vieru hails from the Brasov area around Sacele and has traveled there several times to act as a coach and commentator for his cage fighting shows.
It was Mr Vieru who spoke to the Tates about the new Vasile Mezdrea block of flats outside Sarcele, telling them that the developer was in desperate need of funds to complete the building and that they could secure the flats at reduced price.
He says Andrew and Tristan Tate brought money home from the UK, but their fortunes grew rapidly in Romania.
The search for this wealth – how it was made and where it came from – is believed to be part of investigations into allegations of rape and human trafficking currently being carried out by Romania’s Organized Crime Unit.
Sacele’s features seem to have made them very small. They sold them a few years later when they moved to Bucharest for only a few thousand euros in profit.
But they left this mountain refuge with a new business: Talisman Enterprises profits from web portals, according to official Romanian records. It hasn’t made a profit since 2017.
Sebastien Vieru says he acts as financial executor for the company, which is registered at an address 15 kilometers from Sacele and was until recently owned by Mr Vieru’s parents.
He also owns a 10% stake in a real estate company called War Room Vegas, also registered at the same address and partly owned by Andrew Tate.
The other is Andrew’s friend, Georgiana Naghel, a former employee of Mr. Vieru’s cage fighting business.
According to official Romanian records, Andrew and Tristan transferred all their shares and management of Talisman Enterprises to them in August last year.
The transfer of the business to Ms Naghel, a Romanian national, came four months after police began investigating the brothers. There is no evidence that the two actions are related.
Andrew Tate has amassed millions of social media followers where he posts about a lavish lifestyle
Talisman Enterprises is also affiliated with another company that lists Ms. Naghel as the sole shareholder, director and beneficiary; a management consulting firm called New Era Learning, founded in August 2022.
No financial records are listed for the company.
A third company, a consultancy called Groundbreaking Developments, was also transferred to Ms Naghel in August. In October it was sold to another company owned by Abigail Tyson, believed to be a close associate of the Tate brothers.
Ms Naghel is currently being held with the Tate brothers and another Romanian national, Luana Radu. None of them have yet been charged.
In recent weeks, investigators have confiscated numerous assets from the four suspects, including Talisman Enterprises.
They also searched a long list of the brothers’ possessions, including land in Brasov County and homes in and around Bucharest.
Designer watches have been confiscated and the brothers’ fleet of luxury cars have been removed from their warehouse-like complex on the outskirts of the capital.
Observers believe much of the Tate’s wealth may have come from their investments in a major Romanian casino chain and their online training courses on Andrew Tate’s rigid model of masculinity.
The investigation could answer questions about how the couple went from their cheap mountain apartment to the world of Bugattis, cigars and private jets, which have been posted on social media accounts.
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