Feature
September 26, 2024
Consider four strategies for compromise.
Drafting Tips
September 26, 2024
Simply requiring tenants to comply with the ADA isn’t enough.
Pop Quiz
September 26, 2024
The right of a party to terminate a contract when the other party to the agreement commits a material breach is a fundamental principle of contract law. The black letter law: “A party’s continuing obligations under a contract are conditioned on there being no uncured material failure by...
Owner Wins
September 26, 2024
What Happened: Six months after an executive recruiting agency moved into its new office, employees began experiencing rashes and congestion while at work, problems that eased as soon as they left the building. Dissatisfied with building management’s response to its complaints, the agency...
Owner Loses
September 26, 2024
What Happened: A medical tenant remained in possession and paid the landlord normal rent after its one-year lease term expired. The landlord accepted the rent payments and didn’t demand that the tenant leave. Six months later, the property suffered flood damage. The tenant asked the landlord...
Owner Loses
September 26, 2024
What Happened: A pedestrian sues the store owner and landlord for negligence after tripping over allegedly defective cellar doors located on the sidewalk in front of the premises. The landlord asks to be let out of the suit under state laws relieving out-of-possession landlords who have no duty to...
Feature
August 27, 2024
Offering any tenant rent relief is inherently risky.
Like so many landlords these days, you may be considering restructuring your lease to aid a percentage rent tenant that’s struggling to stay afloat. While avoiding a vacancy by helping the tenant stay in business is clearly in...
Traps to Avoid
August 27, 2024
It’s neither contradictory nor uncommon to lease space to a tenant in “as-is” condition while also promising to maintain some or all of that space, such as the roof or parking lot, until the transfer is complete. You just need to be careful about how you word the obligation.
Owner Loses
August 27, 2024
What Happened: A high-end restaurant operator leased property on Holyoke Street in Harvard Square knowing that the university/landlord was planning to undertake a major, four-year construction project spanning an entire city block across the street. The blasting work began two months later. A few...
Owner Loses
August 27, 2024
What Happened: A landlord took a cosmetology school tenant and its guarantors to court for failing to pay rent in 2020 while government COVID-19 shutdown orders were in effect. The defendants raised the usual affirmative defenses including force majeure and frustration of purpose. And, as usual,...
