What You Need to Know About Commercial Leasing

In this video, OMB Solicitors' Partner and Accredited Property Law Specialist, Simon Bennett, talks about the differences between retail and non-retail commercial leasing.

Transcript

You Need to Know About Commercial Leasing

Hi there, Simon Bennett from OMB Solicitors. Today, I wanted to talk to you about commercial leasing, now, there's two real types of commercial leasing, which is retail and non-retail.

Much like it sounds, non-retail is for businesses or operations which generally don't involve the point-of-contact sale to consumers of goods and services, so it's things like manufacturing, industrial, offices, storage.

These non-retail leases pretty much are unregulated to a larger degree than the retail leases, where you can contract in and out of certain terms in your lease.

Now, the retail, on the other hand, is more the point of sale with customers, and these retail businesses are actually listed in the Retail Shop Leases Act.

It also quite interestingly, includes non-retail businesses in a retail shopping centre, and a retail shopping centre is a complex or a centre which has five or more retail businesses.

So even a non-retail use in one of those centres would be considered a retail lease for the purposes of the Retail Shop Leases Act. So why is this relevant? Well, retail leases are much more strictly governed than a non-retail lease.

The Retail Shop Leases Act effectively contracts in certain mandatory terms to any lease, which you can't contract out of. It will cover things like necessary disclosure from both a landlord and a tenant.

It will include methodologies which are allowed or not allowed for reviewing your rent. It will include prescriptive ways that your options must be exercised if you have a further term, and it will provide certain protections that aren't necessarily in a non-retail lease.

It also covers what to do in the event of a retail shop leasing dispute. At OMB Solicitors Property Law team, we're here to help you with all your leasing requirements.