An Edina senior housing complex caught up in lawsuits involving the project's lender has filed for bankruptcy protection while it attempts to reorganize.

Gramercy Club of Edina filed a Chapter 11 petition Wednesday in St. Paul listing assets of up to $50,000 and liabilities of up to $10 million.

Gramercy Club's president is Tim Nichols, whose company, Cooperative Communities, developed the 126-unit project. Two business entities connected to Nichols were listed as Gramercy Club of Edina's largest unsecured creditors. Nine Mile Partners listed claims of about $2.29 million, while Nichols Equities listed claims of $823,437.

The Gramercy Club boasts on its website that it was once "selected as the 'Best New Senior Housing Development'" in an annual competition sponsored by the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal. The 126-unit development opened in 2007 and is a cooperative, not a condominium. Residents don't buy their units but instead are shareholders in the Gramercy Club of Edina corporation that owns the property.

Because of that ownership structure, each resident was sued individually last year by a bank that also filed a foreclosure suit against Gramercy Club of Edina after it defaulted on $25 million in loans. The lender argued that all of the units were subject to foreclosure. The residents' attorney argued that they were protected from foreclosure by releases they signed when they bought into the co-op. The case is pending in Hennepin County District Court.

Jim Campbell, a resident who has followed the lawsuit closely, said Wednesday that he and his neighbors have incurred about $200,000 in legal costs. He expressed concern that the bankruptcy filing could further complicate their efforts to separate themselves from Nichols' legal and financial problems.

"[Nichols] has been threatening to file bankruptcy for months," Campbell said. "This could bounce our case into a totally different court."

Neither Nichols nor his attorney could be reached for comment.

Susan Feyder • 612-673-1723