Tulare
County - Utah-based Woodside Homes, with eight new home subdivisions
in Tulare County, said it will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy by Sept. 16,
according to company spokesperson Jennifer Mercer.
One of the top ten builders in the U.S., the company has tracts in both Tulare and Visalia and throughout Central and Northern California.
Mercer emphasizes that in a court hearing a judge gave the company permission to continue its homebuilding activities in a business-as-usual fashion.
“We have contacted all the subcontractors, new home buyers with contracts and subdivision homeowners to notify them of the bankruptcy process.”
Mercer emphasized that the company will be providing lenders with an accounting of its financial activities. On Aug. 20, five insurance companies which had more than $475 million of Woodside's notes, filed a petition in court to push the builder into bankruptcy court in order to help collect their debts. Two other lenders joined in the petition, setting the court proceedings in motion.
Woodside entered the Tulare County market in 2005 with one of its largest
new home projects just north of Goshen Avenue and east of Demaree Street.
The homebuilder was a part of a wave of large national and regional new homebuilders
that came to Visalia that year with the peak of the building activity in 2006.
Others joined the land rush into Tulare County including Reynen and Bardis,
DR Horton, Pacific Union and Beazer Homes – all no longer in the area
today due to the massive nationwide slowdown in housing.
In 2007, Woodside had more than $1 billion in revenue and was ranked number seven on a list of the nation's top builders.
Even this year, during the homebuilder meltdown, Woodside pulled permits for 87 new homes in Tulare County, according to Construction Monitor, making it the third busiest builder in the county this year. That compares to 91 during the same eight months of 2007 and 101 during the same months in 2006. The pace shows only a modest slowdown in the number of new homes being built here by the company despite the state of the economy.
Whether the company can work through its voluntary bankruptcy period and live to tell about it remains up in the air, but for now the homebuilding, sales and guarantees will continue during the bankruptcy period, says Mercer.
Besides California, the company operates in Utah, Arizona, Florida, Minnesota,
Nevada, Texas and near Washington, D.C.
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