Fleetwood Enterprises Emerges from Bankruptcy
On July 29, 2010, the Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California approved the Chapter 11 plan in the Fleetwood Enterprises reorganization (the “Plan”). The Plan represents a broad settlement of the major disputes involving certain key creditor constituents, including secured lenders, noteholders and trade claimants. The Plan contemplates the distribution of the proceeds from the liquidation of Fleetwood’s assets and the resolution of outstanding claims through a liquidating trust. FocalPoint Partners, investment banker to the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors (the “Committee”), played an active role throughout the reorganization, including the sale of the various operating divisions, and was a key player in the negotiation of the settlement and the Plan. The Committee was represented by Hamid Rafatjoo of Venable LLP. Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP represented the Company and Peter Kravitz of SltnTrst LLC will act as liquidating trustee.
Fleetwood filed a voluntary petition for relief under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code on March 9, 2009. Prior to its petition, Fleetwood was among the nation’s leading producers of manufactured housing and recreational vehicles. Fleetwood had approximately 3,700 people located in 19 manufacturing facilities in 11 states. Despite prepetition attempts to cut costs, restructure business operations, and address cash short falls from operations to improve liquidity, and given the ongoing dislocation of the capital markets, economic decline and weakness in both the recreational vehicle and manufactured housing markets, the measures taken by Fleetwood to cut costs and restructure its business operations were ineffective in addressing its financial challenges. As a result, Fleetwood was forced to file for chapter 11 bankruptcy.
After considering a number of alternatives, Fleetwood, its creditors and their advisors agreed that selling Fleetwood’s individual business units would be the best approach to maximize value for all constituents, including FocalPoint’s constituency of unsecured creditors. To that end, Fleetwood’s military housing division was sold to Berkshire Hathaway’s subsidiary Clayton Homes; its motor homes division was sold to the private equity firm American Industrial Partners; and its manufactured housing division was sold to Cavco Industries.
Following the sale of Fleetwood’s business units, FocalPoint along with other key advisors and constituents began work to resolve the remaining major disputes, including the distribution of proceeds between the general unsecured creditors and various classes of bondholders. After several months of negotiations, a settlement was reached involving certain key creditor constituents, the details of which are reflected in the Plan recently confirmed by the Court. The Plan became effective as of August 23, 2010. “A global settlement between the bondholders and the trade creditors was certainly in the best interests of all parties, and I’m pleased we were able to reach an agreement,” said Alexander Stevenson, Managing Director of FocalPoint.
Hamid Rafatjoo of Venable LLP, counsel to the Committee of Unsecured Creditors indicated that “the settlement took into account a variety of complex legal and financial questions and allowed the estate to avoid costly inter-creditor litigation that would have negatively impacted everyone’s recoveries.” With the Plan becoming effective, stewardship of the remaining Fleetwood assets has been turned over to Peter Kravitz of SltnTrst LLC who is serving as liquidating trustee. Mr. Kravitz added, “Now that the plan has been confirmed, we can all focus on maximizing recoveries by monetizing the remaining assets in a reasonable and orderly fashion while distributing funds to creditors in the most efficient manner possible”.
About FocalPoint Securities, LLC
FocalPoint Securities, LLC is an independent investment bank specializing in mergers and acquisitions, private placements (both debt and equity), financial restructurings and distressed transactions. The firm serves middle market clients throughout the United States.
About Venable LLP
With nearly 600 lawyers, Venable LLP provides legal advisory services to a wide range of clients, including 40 of the Fortune 100 companies, in all areas of corporate and business law, complex litigation, intellectual property and regulatory and government affairs. The firm is based in Washington, District Of Columbia with additional offices in New York, New York; Los Angeles, California; Rockville, Baltimore, and Towson, Maryland; and Vienna, Virginia.
About SltnTrst LLC
Solution Trust administers liquidating trusts and its principals serve on board of directors and bankruptcy oversight committees. Its managing principal, Peter Kravitz, currently serves on the Circuit City, Landsource Communities Development LLC, National RV and Asyst Technology Liquidating Trust oversight committees and administers the Fleetwood Liquidating Trust. Solution Trust is currently slated to administer the Right Start Inc./BabyStyle and GTS 900 F LLC trusts upon confirmation of their respective plans of liquidation.
Please contact Alex Stevenson at 310-405-7000 with any questions about this transaction.