It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke. An individual walks into a bar and says “Where’s my LLC?” But that was the question a Bankruptcy Appellate Panel recently had to answer. The court had to determine whether Nevada was the proper venue in an involuntary bankruptcy case. The debtor’s only connection with Nevada was that his principal assets consisted of interests in a Nevada LLC and a Nevada limited partnership.

In Heritage Pacific Financial LLC v. Machuca, 2012 DJDAR 16803 (2012), the US Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the Ninth Circuit decided an interesting attorney fee case arising in the commercial litigation context. The fee award was given to the debtor arising from adversary proceedings initiated by a creditor, a commercial bank.

A golf course may look like a solid piece of collateral. After all, golfers will pay good money to play and the green fees and driving range fees golfers pay to play the course will generate a revenue stream. This revenue stream can be pledged to a lender and used to support loans to the owner of the course. Lenders love to finance a business that generates a steady revenue stream, making a golf course look like an attractive form of collateral.

Are golf course revenues "rents"?

A golf course may look like a solid piece of collateral. After all, golfers will pay good money to play and the green fees and driving range fees golfers pay to play the course will generate a revenue stream. This revenue stream can be pledged to a lender and used to support loans to the owner of the course. Lenders love to finance a business that generates a steady revenue stream, making a golf course look like an attractive form of collateral.

In what it described as a novel issue of law in the Eighth Circuit (the Federal Circuit including Minnesota and North Dakota), the United States Bankruptcy Appellate Panel (BAP) for the Eighth Circuit recently ruled in In re Lewis and Clark Apartments, LP that, in a valuation of the debtor’s low income housing project for purposes of its proposed Plan of Reorganization, the value of the low income housing tax credits (LIHTC) attributable to the project must be included.  While this is a result lenders involved in the LIHTC industry may have assumed, it was not settled

The Bottom Line:

In Shelton v. CitiMortgage, Inc. (In re Shelton), --- B.R. --- (B.A.P. 8th Cir. Sept. 24, 2012), the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals determined that a secured creditor’s lien cannot be avoided simply because the creditor’s claim was disallowed as being filed after the proof of claim bar date.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit held on Aug. 3, 2012, that equitable considerations could not prevent a creditor's recouping amounts owed to it by a chapter 7 debtor. Terry v. Standard Ins. Co. (In re Terry), 2012 WL 3139364, *4 (8th Cir. Aug. 3, 2012). Reversing the bankruptcy court and the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel ("BAP"), the Eighth Circuit explained that "once a party meets the same-transaction test . . . a court should not impose an additional 'balancing of the equities' requirement" on the doctrine of recoupment. Id.

In Schwartz-Tallard v. America's Servincing Co.

Chapter 11 creditors’ committees and debtors continue to challenge lenders’ prepayment premiums, commitment fees and post-bankruptcy interest claims in reorganization cases. Nevertheless, courts regularly reject these challenges in well-reasoned decisions.