Minnesota Lawyer
Lighthouse Management Group Inc.
A lighthouse provides guidance to ships and helps them navigate safely. So it is an apt name for a turnaround business for distressed companies. Lighthouse Management Group gets companies through workouts, assignments for the benefit of creditors, receiverships and bankruptcies, with Sam Sigelman as its director and general counsel.
Sigelman and others drafted an update to the real estate provisions of the Minnesota receivership statute, Minn. Stat. § 576.30, giving the receiver the rights of a judicial lien creditor with respect to the real estate that is in receivership and explains how a receiver can convey interest in real estate.
This assists in the closing process, of which he has handled dozens and dozens, Sigelman said. It is included in the White Pages guide to title standards.
Receivership is typically initiated by a lender that is concerned about an “insecure situation,” Sigelman explained. “They’d rather have an independent party oversee the business.” Lighthouse was recently appointed to oversee and market for sale a shopping mall in St. Cloud.
Lighthouse was appointed a receiver for the Wabasha Tower in St. Paul, once the home of Ecolab. Reportedly lenders and city officials became alarmed that $472,000 in insurance and basic utilities like heating, water and electricity had gone unpaid. The property was sold on December 29, 2022, to a company that plans luxury apartments for approximately $18 million. There were reportedly $2.5 million in contractor liens on the property.
In addition to the White Pages, Sigelman has contributed to lawyers’ libraries as one of the editors of the Debtor Creditor Handbook, a Minnesota CLE publication. He is also involved in the Real Estate Institute’s Minnesota case law update.
And, in other news, Sigelman is likely the only lawyer named to the Power 30 by Minnesota Lawyer who has been nominated for a sports Emmy, for his former career as producer of baseball broadcasting for ESPN.
