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Setting a workable commencement date for a lease to begin is one of the most important aspects of lease negotiations. But it often isn’t thought through by either owners or tenants. As with many overlooked parts of a lease deal, it takes a back seat to big ticket items like cotenancy clauses, renewal options, and use provisions. However, so many things depend on when the lease begins, you need to make an informed decision about how you should set a lease commencement date.
Occasionally, a CRE landlord will choose to be in a joint venture with a tenant, but it’s not typical. Unfortunately, under certain circumstances, someone could try to argue that you are in a joint venture in order to hold you liable for an event or accident. So consider whether you’re inadvertently meeting the joint venture criteria and adjust accordingly if you don’t want to be on the hook for the situation that recently threatened a Mississippi landlord.
Pennsylvania commercial real estate owners and tenants are both about to the feel the impact of the Keystone State’s recent decision to legalize medical marijuana. That’s because dispensaries will be looking for space in shopping centers, which could be lucrative for owners whose properties have all the right characteristics for that type of business; it could be a terrifying proposition for a tenant whose business nature is at odds with marijuana sales, even though it’s legal.
Your shopping center leases probably require each tenant to pay its share of the center’s fire insurance, liability insurance, and other kinds of insurance. However, if you want to pass through your insurance costs to your tenants as a separate component of common area maintenance (CAM) costs solely by using a standard formula based on “gross leasable area,” it could leave you on the hook for costs you thought would be paid by your tenants.
While many commercial leases are for several-year terms, it might behoove you to agree to a month-to-month tenancy with a tenant. Month-to-month tenants can be part of a strategic plan for your property, especially if you have spaces that you’d like to collect rent for in the short term while looking for longer term tenants. If you rent a space on a month-to-month basis to a tenant without a lease, don’t take termination of the tenancy less seriously than you would for a long-term lease.
The Urban Land Institute’s most recent commercial real estate survey has revealed the CRE market’s anticipated trajectory. CRE has benefitted from six consecutive years of growth, but the experts polled by ULI predict that it will taper off by 2017. The slower growth in property prices and rental rates won’t be dangerous, though, as survey respondents said that “better-than-average” operating fundamentals in most property types would still be seen.
Nonpayment of rent is the most common breach of a tenant’s lease—and can be a major signal that trouble is on the horizon. That trouble could come in many forms: A tenant becomes bankrupt or has financial issues, it withholds its rent because of a perceived problem that you’ll have to hash out, or it has found a better space and is preparing to move out despite its lease.
Q: I recently bought a building comprised of several commercial condo spaces. A restaurant tenant has expressed interest in one of the spaces, but I’m apprehensive. The space is subject to the governing documents of an association, and restaurant tenants have more hoops to jump through, such as getting approval for improvements that typical retail tenants don’t need, like gas lines.
Winter is approaching and with it will come snow, rain, and freezing conditions in some parts of the country. Some office building or mall owners put out “wet floor” signs during rainy or snowy weather to warn customers about slippery conditions that could quickly develop on the floors of the property. In just a few minutes, water can collect, creating a hazard.
In a perfect commercial real estate world, shopping center and retail leases wouldn’t be subject to variables that could negatively affect your profitability. In reality, inflation—which is impossible to predict with complete certainty—can affect your bottom line unless you and the tenant agree to use “rent escalation” to keep up with the market. This isn’t as simple as it sounds, though. There are several methods that can be used to do this, and pros and cons for each.
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