Furniture-store foreclosure sought

Iberia Bank is seeking foreclosure on the long-vacant former Brandon House furniture store at 1100 S. University Ave. in Little Rock after what it said was failure to meet the terms of two forbearance agreements on a loan of more than $4 million.

MBC Holdings LLC, whose partners are developers Bruce Burrow of Jonesboro and Marty Belz of Memphis, are the defendants, according to documents filed Nov. 30 in Pulaski County Circuit Court.

Burrow said in a telephone interview Tuesday that he and Belz plan to countersue the bank. He alleged that the suit is “a transparent effort to get us to quickly liquidate the property ... below value.”

Burrow filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 on July 30, blaming the failure of the proposed Shoppes at North Hills as one reason. Chapter 11 allows for restructuring, as opposed to liquidation. He said Belz was not part of that filing.

MBC borrowed $4.4 million from Iberia in March 2006, two years after Brandon House was liquidated, to buy the University property and planned to convert it into an office or medical complex. The conversion never happened. The loan was refinanced in February 2011, committing rent income from the property.

The partners entered two forbearance agreements in July 2011 to keep the lender at bay. Collateral in the agreements includes a 1991 business jet, tax increment financing district bonds for the Turtle Creek mall in Jonesboro and real estate in Colorado.

Burrow and Belz partnered in the $40 million conversion of the Excelsior Hotel in downtown Little Rock into the Peabody, and the major renovation of the Hilton hotel at Interstate 630 and University, which was being rebranded Monday as a Clarion hotel.