New unsecured lease
- Thread starter Sandhu
- Start date
Help Support SalonGeek:
You need to discuss with a solicitor, a few hundred quid on an appointment could save thousands in the long run. We are not legal experts and nor should we be.
Yes my solicitor is involved and he passed this info to me from the landlord solicitor. Unfortunately my solicitor isn’t advising much on this.
You're paying, find a better solicitor. We can't help you, it's not our area of expertise.
I’m assuming you’ve been offered a lease that excludes security of tenure under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954. It’s quite usual for a commercial lease to be offered on these terms - usually for shorter leases.
Leases which give full statutory security are usually offered on a full repairing basis, so in other words if you take on responsibility to maintain the building you have a right to renew your lease.
What type of lease is right for you is personal to your circumstances. However even if you have security of tenure your landlord can still kick you out if they want to occupy the premises themselves or redevelop the building. For example a fish and chip shop near me had a full commercial kitchen refit at a cost of £50k after 25 years in business. 4 years later their landlord sold the building to Tescos and said “sorry you have to go”. They were devastated because if they’d known, they’d never have bothered installing an upgraded kitchen and would have planned their retirement when their lease expired. They couldn’t even sell their business because the whole building was being ripped down for redevelopment. What they should have done was asked their landlord for a new lease before they made their kitchen investment.
In general, you need security of tenure if you are going to be spending a lot of money on tenants improvements. If you are installing new floors, plumbed in pedi sinks and hairstylists wash basins and customising the internal layout, you want to know you can stay - as long as you can pay, and you usually take a longer lease. If the location is particularly important to you and you don’t feel you could successfully relocate, you will have to think carefully before you commit to premises without security of tenure.
If you want the flexibility to be able to pack your bags and go if the business doesn’t succeed after a few years, or if you’d ideally like to relocate to a better location, you may be quite happy to exclude your statutory rights.
Your solicitor can explain the options but they can’t tell you what is best for your circumstances because it’s your decision at the end of the day. If you don’t have security of tenure you have to make a statutory declaration to prove that you understand what you are signing,
Leases which give full statutory security are usually offered on a full repairing basis, so in other words if you take on responsibility to maintain the building you have a right to renew your lease.
What type of lease is right for you is personal to your circumstances. However even if you have security of tenure your landlord can still kick you out if they want to occupy the premises themselves or redevelop the building. For example a fish and chip shop near me had a full commercial kitchen refit at a cost of £50k after 25 years in business. 4 years later their landlord sold the building to Tescos and said “sorry you have to go”. They were devastated because if they’d known, they’d never have bothered installing an upgraded kitchen and would have planned their retirement when their lease expired. They couldn’t even sell their business because the whole building was being ripped down for redevelopment. What they should have done was asked their landlord for a new lease before they made their kitchen investment.
In general, you need security of tenure if you are going to be spending a lot of money on tenants improvements. If you are installing new floors, plumbed in pedi sinks and hairstylists wash basins and customising the internal layout, you want to know you can stay - as long as you can pay, and you usually take a longer lease. If the location is particularly important to you and you don’t feel you could successfully relocate, you will have to think carefully before you commit to premises without security of tenure.
If you want the flexibility to be able to pack your bags and go if the business doesn’t succeed after a few years, or if you’d ideally like to relocate to a better location, you may be quite happy to exclude your statutory rights.
Your solicitor can explain the options but they can’t tell you what is best for your circumstances because it’s your decision at the end of the day. If you don’t have security of tenure you have to make a statutory declaration to prove that you understand what you are signing,
Thank you! Exactly that and they want me to sign 10 year lease. After that it’s not renewable. I do the love the location and it’s a good size shop, the repair are tenant responsibility.
Well why don’t you try contacting a commercial surveyor who does lease negotiations (not everyone does) for some advice?
If your solicitor isn’t being very responsive to helping you work through and understand the pros and cons of your lease offer it may be that they don’t have much experience of this type of work.
A commercial surveyor can help you with lease negotiations and a good one will know what the “going rate” is locally and may even have dealt with your landlord before. Personally, I’ve found surveyors much more down to earth and practical and their advice has been invaluable.
If your solicitor isn’t being very responsive to helping you work through and understand the pros and cons of your lease offer it may be that they don’t have much experience of this type of work.
A commercial surveyor can help you with lease negotiations and a good one will know what the “going rate” is locally and may even have dealt with your landlord before. Personally, I’ve found surveyors much more down to earth and practical and their advice has been invaluable.
That is a great advice and I have heard of them, do you know how much this cost? Also the landlord solicitors are being pushy to sign everything and given a deadline for tomorrow. So I am not sure how soon a surveyor can help me?! Thank you
