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Q A tenant that rents space in one of my office buildings has been struggling. It didn't pay rent for several months. I sued the tenant for nonpayment of base rent and additional rent. We signed a “stipulation of settlement” in which it agreed that if it didn't pay its overdue rent in six installments, I could evict it. By that time, the situation had begun to affect my ability to pay the mortgage and other...

Q The maintenance team at my shopping center occasionally forgets to make very minor repairs. I'm working with them to make sure that they're more diligent about these things. But in the meantime, a tenant is threatening to stop paying rent, and even terminate its lease. It says that I've breached the lease by failing to keep up the common areas as I'm required to under the lease. I've suspected that this t...

Q A prospective tenant seemed very interested in the space it planned to rent in my office building, but dragged out negotiations for longer than necessary. Although it signed my letter of intent, after my attorney drafted the lease, it announced that it found a better space in another building. I've started the leasing process all over again, but I can't afford to pay the costs of preparing, negotiating, and revising ...

Q My lease with a tenant in my shopping center gives it an option to renew for an additional 10-year term. Under the lease, the tenant must exercise its option by sending a letter by certified mail to me by a certain date. When I hadn't heard from the tenant by that date, I assumed that it wanted to move out of the space at the end of the lease term, and I made efforts to find a replacement tenant.

Q I signed a lease with a tenant for office building space more than 20 years ago. The lease was to expire in 2011, but included an option for the tenant to renew for a five-year period. During the original term, the lease was assigned to a string of subsequent tenants. Under the lease, the current tenant could exercise the option to renew its term for an additional five years—if it notified me of its intention to e...

Q My tenant operates a restaurant in the space I rent to it. The lease for the space is nearing its end, and the tenant plans to move out instead of renewing the lease. The tenant is claiming that lighting fixtures and a liquor bar that are built into the space are trade fixtures and that it should be allowed to remove the items at the lease's end.

Q I signed a short-term lease with a “merger” clause for retail space in my strip mall. The tenant's business was profitable there, and about halfway through the short-term lease, the tenant and I discussed the possibility of extending the lease by five years when the term was up. However, we never actually signed an extension of the lease.

Q During negotiations for an office building lease, I sent a prospective tenant several emails stating the space's square footage. The square footage that I quoted should have been big enough for the tenant's business needs. The tenant signed a lease for the office, but now it's having trouble fitting all of its furniture and equipment in the space.

Q I'm thinking of renting space in the first floor of the mixed-use building I own to a successful retailer. I'd like to offer the tenant a long-term lease because I think it will bring substantial foot traffic to the other stores in the building. I'm planning on offering the tenant a 15-year lease with 10 options to renew for consecutive 10-year periods. However, I'm concerned that if the tenant wants to get o...

Q Several tenants have already moved into the shopping center I own, although parts of the center are still under construction. When the project is complete, the center will consist of five freestanding buildings. One tenant's lease has an opening co-tenancy requirement permitting it to pay only half of its monthly rent if less than 50 percent of the center is leased, and to continue paying reduced rent until the opening c...