The question of whether a debtor can obtain an exemption under 11 U.S.C. § 1146(a) from having to pay stamp or similar tax in a pre-confirmation asset transfer was decisively answered in the negative by the United States Supreme Court last year.[1] However, whether the exemption applies to a pre-confirmation sale that closed post-confirmation remains an issue with which courts must continue to struggle.

Expansive View of 363(m) Mootness Adopted

By: John P. Esposito

St. John’s Law Student

American Bankruptcy Institute Law Review Staff

Recently, in a case of first impression, the Sixth Circuit was presented with the opportunity to address the interaction of the “mootness” provision of section 363(m)[1] and the power of a trustee under section 363(h) to sell “both the estate’s interest . . . and the interest of any co-owner in [estate] property.”[2] In In re Nashville Senior Living, LLC,[3] the Sixth Circuit held that a non-debtor co-owners’ failure to obtain a stay of the bankruptcy court’s order approving the sale of both the debtors’ interest and the interests of the co-owners in jointly-owned property rendered an appeal to undo the sale as moot.[4] The court rejected, as “an aberration in well-settled bankruptcy jurisprudence,”[5] the contrary reasoning of the Ninth Circuit in Clear Channel Outdoor, Inc. v. Knupfer (In re PW, LLC)[6], which held that mootness could not apply to the “free and clear” aspect of a sale authorized under section 363(f). In essence, the Sixth Circuit interpreted section 363’s mootness provision expansively to cover sales under subsection (h),[7] despite the fact that 363(m) explicitly applies only to sales under sections 363(b)[8] or (c).[9]

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