Friday July 25, 2008 at 4:40pm
The rolling break is a tool that is seldom used but it can be beneficial to both landlords and tenants. A standard break clause gives you one shot at ending your lease. You have to serve notice in the right way and at the right time and sometimes have to satisfy other conditions for the break to be effective. If you fail to exercise the break correctly you may be stuck in a lease you don't want for years to come. The rolling break overcomes these problems by allowing you to terminate the lease a....
(read more...)Thursday July 24, 2008 at 4:42pm
Does the idea of a long term legally binding commitment frighten you? You might be starting up in business or just need the flexibility to leave premises at short notice. You might be a property owner who doesn't want a tenant to acquire rights of occupation. For both parties, the cost of employing lawyers to negotiate a fifty page document can also be prohibitive. Here are a few alternatives: Tenancy at Will This is the 'one night stand' of property relationships. A tenancy at will gives a tena....
(read more...)Wednesday July 23, 2008 at 4:44pm
When it's a cat. Confused? So were the people who thought they were buying a piglet only to find that when they opened the bag (or poke) that there was a cat inside. This gave rise to the well known phrase 'buy a pig in a poke' meaning to purchase something without examining it first. It's also thought to be the origin of the phrase 'to let the cat out of the bag' meaning to reveal the secret. Purchasing a business can be like buying a pig in a poke. Very often all you know about the business is....
(read more...)Tuesday July 22, 2008 at 4:46pm
You'd be forgiven for asking that question the first time you hear about BREEAM. It is, in fact, the Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (no wonder they use an acronym). BREEAM is the world's most widely used environmental assessment method for buildings. BREEAM assesses buildings against a set criteria and provides an overall score which will fall within a band providing either a PASS, GOOD, VERY GOOD or EXCELLENT rating. It ties in with the Code For Sustainable Home....
(read more...)Monday July 21, 2008 at 4:49pm
Well, you wouldn't quite describe 16 of the country's biggest retailers as worms, but they are turning on their landlords in a bid to change the way they pay their rent. They are asking their landlords to allow them to pay rent monthly rather than quarterly. It's another sign that the hard-pressed retail sector is doing everything it can to improve its cashflow as high street spending continues to fall. Although their landlords will have no obligation to agree as the payment obligations will be ....
(read more...)Thursday July 10, 2008 at 4:52pm
The Government's definition of a zero carbon home is contained in the snappily titled The Stamp Duty Land Tax (Zero-Carbon Homes Relief) Regulations 2007. This is not merely of academic interest. The first purchaser of a zero-carbon home will pay no Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) on the purchase if the price is £500,000 or less and will have their SDLT bill reduced by £15,000 if the house costs more than £500,000. The house must satisfy three tests: 1. The Heat Loss Parameter of th....
(read more...)Friday July 4, 2008 at 4:55pm
If you have ever negotiated a lease of commercial premises you will probably have come across the term 'upwards only rent review'. For those of you who haven't, it is quite simply a provision in a lease which allows the rent to be reassessed (typically every five years but it can be reviewed at any time in principle) by reference to the rent a landlord would be able to charge a new tenant at the time of the review but crucially the review cannot cause the rent to fall. During the last ten years,....
(read more...)Thursday July 3, 2008 at 4:57pm
Many of us love living in a 'character' property but with energy costs rising exponentially, many of us could be paying a heavy price for the privilege. The problem with many older properties is twofold: they tend to be very poorly insulated and the method of heating them can be very inefficient. The extreme example would be heating an old farmhouse with an oil-fired Aga but even the traditional gas-fired boiler is desperately inefficient compared to some of the alternatives now on the market. T....
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