Whoever the Orange County bankruptcy attorney was for Mr. and Mrs. John Gantes, he or she had a lot of paperwork to go through, and lots of debt for which to account.
From the Orange County Register online:
“The preliminary numbers are in for the personal bankruptcy of John Gantes, who controls the Breckenridge Group and some 200 affiliates. He and his wife, Linda Bridgford Gantes (of the Bridgford Foods clan), filed papers in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Santa Ana Tuesday listing assets of $2,697,466.81 against $345,313,071.99 in liabilities. The vast majority of the liabilities are unsecured.
Gantes filed separate Chapter 11 reorganization petitions for 25 of his businesses in November and December. He followed up with a personal Chapter 7 liquidation petition for himself and his wife. The personal case appears to be designed to cancel about $200 million in personal guarantees that Gantes signed on behalf of his businesses.
Major creditors include Farmers & Merchants Bank, which holds a $22 million third mortgage on the Gantes’ home in Laguna Niguel; the petition says the house really is worth $2,653,188.
Farmers & Merchants spokesman Evan Pondel said Thursday afternoon that the loan is secured by several commercial properties as well as the home. He would not say how many commercial properties secure the mortgage or how much they are worth.”
While the commercial properties securing the loan might be from Rancho Santa Margarita, Irvine, San Juan Capistrano, or even Tustin, this is one expensive Orange County home — leading to a big, fat, Orange County bankruptcy.
