Parliament House neighbor ‘The Gardens’ files bankruptcy – Orlando Sentinel

Financial trouble for the Parliament House, a 40-year-old gay-themed resort on Orlandos west side, isnt letting up.

The resort itself emerged from bankruptcy last year, but fell into a foreclosure lawsuit again in December which is still pending. This week, a neighboring and related development called The Gardens LLC, a timeshare condo, has filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

The Gardens declared more than $10 million in debt and liabilities, including a $3.9 million loan guaranty for the main Parliament House resort. In related news, another gay club near the Parliament House, Woodstock Orlando LLC, also filed a Chapter 7 bankruptcy on June 28.

Someone who operates the Facebook page for Woodstock (formerly Full Moon) said that bar is not necessarily closing, even though a Chapter 7 bankruptcy is a liquidation, but they declined to elaborate. A manager of Woodstock Orlando, Darryl Bernard Sheppard, filed a personal Chapter 13 bankruptcy in May.

The Gardens was built just before the Great Recession rocked the real estate and banking world. Its owners include Parliament House owners Don Granatstein and Susan Unger. Another shareholder of The Gardens is Lutfi Investments, which also owns the property that Woodstock occupies.

Unger also filed a bankruptcy earlier this year, but that case was tossed out after none of the required financial documents were filed.

Granatstein told the Sentinel in December that the latest financial trouble will be over soon and he will make the loan current. Miami-based Lion Financial foreclosed on a $3.9 million mortgage for the main resort property in December, and that case is still pending. Parliament House attorneys recently filed an answer to the foreclosure complaint.

The main resort is about 10 acres at 410 N. Orange Blossom Trail, adjacent to the Gardens property.

Granatstein has said the Pulse nightclub attack in June 2016 hurt his business too, because people avoided gay clubs in Orlando for a while, holding down his revenue, and by costing another $150,000 for extra security guards and wanding equipment.

Granatstein previously blamed the recession and the collapse of several lenders for his financial troubles. The resort recently joined a worldwide timeshare network, RCI, one of few gay resorts in the network. Granatstein was also hoping that gay tourism and gay marriage would boost business.

Contact me with a business news tip at pbrinkmann@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5660; Twitter is @PaulBrinkmann

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Parliament House neighbor 'The Gardens' files bankruptcy - Orlando Sentinel