Mike Glickman Says His Goodbys : Bankruptcy: The owner of the Valley’s biggest real estate brokerage apologizes for the company’s failure. He promises to repay $2 million owed to creditors.

A tearful Mike Glickman bade farewell to his agents at a press conference Wednesday, and said he takes “full responsibility” for the liquidation of his real estate company. His voice cracking, he also told Mike Glickman Realty Inc. creditors, whom he said he owes about $2 million, “I’m so sorry.”

Glickman assured homeowners that there would be no disruption of pending sales because of his bankruptcy. He also said he was releasing homeowners who have listed with his company from their contractual obligations, but he hoped they would continue dealing with former Glickman agents who move to other companies.

Glickman said he expected to pay off all his debts eventually, but some of his creditors doubted his ability to make good on any promises at this point.

Interrupted by frequent applause and shouts of support from more than 100 of his former agents, Glickman said that he had been caught up in the go-go spirit of the 1980s.

“There is a flip side to success that apparently 1990 has thus far shown,” he said. “In hindsight, I only wish I had grown slower and more sure.”

The 30-year-old entrepreneur, who quickly built the company he launched in 1983 into the San Fernando Valley’s largest real estate firm, filed for personal and corporate bankruptcy liquidation Tuesday.

He said his personal finances have been drained. “I’ve put every penny I have back into Mike Glickman Realty,” he said, including a $1-million bonus that he paid himself last summer, a $2-million loan on his 4,500-square-foot Encino estate--which is on the market for $3.5 million--and the proceeds from the sales of his investment properties. Glickman said he hopes to keep his Malibu condominium, although all his assets are now controlled by a bankruptcy court trustee.

At his peak, Glickman said, his personal net worth totaled $7 million to $10 million.

He said he hoped to land a job at Fred Sands Realtors or Jon Douglas Co., two of Los Angeles’ largest real estate companies. Sands would not comment, but Douglas said Wednesday that he wanted to hire Glickman and was awaiting a decision from him. Douglas has also hired many of Glickman’s former agents.

Glickman spoke in his cavernous Woodland Hills headquarters, where the floor and rows of pink desks were littered with trash as departing agents finished packing. A few agents wore black-and-white “Mike Glickman” T-shirts, and several agents broke into tears after Glickman began speaking.

Glickman said he felt forced into the filing because one creditor, the landlord at his Sherman Oaks office, threatened to sue Glickman Realty and seek a lien against the company’s accounts.

Fearing that other creditors would join in the suit and force an involuntary bankruptcy, Glickman said, he chose instead to make the filing himself.

“Our offices had turned into a fear zone of panic and worry,” he said. “I had to end the negative energy that we had.”

Glickman blamed his troubles on his 1987 Westside expansion. Last month, he closed large offices in Brentwood and Beverly Hills, as well as a Sherman Oaks office.

He said that he failed to secure loans to ease his credit crunch and was unable to sell his company because the combination of the debt owed and the slow sales market made his company virtually worthless.

“If I had it to do all over again, I wouldn’t have gone into the Westside,” Glickman said. With the bankruptcy filing, Glickman’s five offices in Woodland Hills, Sherman Oaks, Encino, Northridge and Agoura have also closed and the company’s more than 1,200 agents have been laid off.

Others have maintained that Glickman’s high overhead and many perks to his agents--including free lunches and valet parking--were a key source of his troubles. That overhead was impossible to maintain after the market began to slow last year, Glickman said, but he added: “I would not have done anything differently.”

Glickman assured homeowners: “There will be no interruption of service on your listings or closing of your escrow on time.” Glickman said his company had about 2,000 listings at the time of the bankruptcy filing.

However, the listings will have to be renewed with another company. If a former Glickman agent retains the listing, Glickman said, he will receive 10% of the agent’s 3% commission on the sale. He said he expects 50% to 60% of the homes to sell, and the fees that he earns, he added, will go to pay creditors.

The money owed to the company on homes in escrow--which Glickman’s father, attorney David Glickman, said totaled about $1.5 million--will also go to pay creditors. Glickman said the company is about two months behind in payment to creditors.

“There will be enough money, hopefully, to pay everyone off in full,” he said.

But a Glickman creditor, Lenn Grabiner, a principal in Grabiner/Hall Designs in Studio City, said many creditors and former agents fear they won’t see their money. “You can’t believe a word he says,” said Grabiner. “For him to say that money is secure, he has no way of guaranteeing that.”

Glickman’s attorney, Arthur Greenberg, acknowledged that no guarantees were possible. “But Mike was very concerned that the way we set this up would have as little impact as possible on the homeowner and the agent. I think we’ve done a pretty good job of setting up a program” that will limit the financial damage, he said.

Greenberg’s partner, Robert Bass, added that the $2 million in debt could go higher if the properties leased by Glickman can’t be re-leased immediately and the owners seek higher damages.

Glickman’s court-appointed trustee, Donald Henry, could not be reached for comment.