Commercial Real Estate Advisors for Tenants: How to Check Whom You Can Trust

What a tenant can verify about an advisor before the first tour

Reputation is hard to audit from outside. Three facts are easy to audit, and together they are what trust in an advisor is made of.

• The side. The name of the party the firm represents on your search, written down in an email or an engagement letter.
• The pay. Who writes the check, under which document, and at what point in the deal.
• The numbers. Street addresses and asking rents handed over before you have signed or promised anything.

Three conflict questions to put in writing before you name a budget

Your budget and your walk-away terms are the two things the other side of a lease would most like to know. Ask these first, by email, so the replies are on record.

• Is any building you might show us one that your firm leases on behalf of its owner?
• If such a building turns up later in the search, when will we hear about it, and will that notice be in writing?
• Is your fee the same whichever building we choose, or would some buildings pay your firm more?

The first question has a name. When a single firm sits on both sides of a lease, that is dual agency, and New York requires informed consent from the tenant and from the owner before it goes ahead. How that consent has to be documented on your deal is a point your attorney should confirm.

Who pays a tenant advisor on a lease, and on a sublease

In most transactions the landlord pays the broker fee, and the tenant writes no separate check. That is the custom, not a rule: the lease and the commission terms settle it on each deal. A sublease works differently, because the company giving up the space usually pays. Ask the advisor to state, for your deal specifically, who pays and under what agreement. The tenant representation agreement explains what the paperwork should say about it.

What a clear answer looks like, and why a pause is an answer

A clear answer is short and specific, and it arrives in writing without a second request. It names the buildings the firm leases for owners in your target neighborhoods, says on what day you would be told if one reached your list, and states the fee arrangement in a sentence. A weak answer changes the subject, falls back on a line about putting clients first, or promises to come back to the pay question later. Treat that hesitation as the reply.

Nomad's disclosure, in plain terms

Nomad Property Group, a licensed New York real estate broker, has its office at 276 Fifth Avenue, Suite 402. On your search, we work for you. Nomad also offers agency leasing and owner representation. That means there are buildings we lease for their owners. Ask us which ones, in writing, before you tell us what you can spend, and hold our reply to the standard described above.

Every listing carries its address, and the asking rent is published wherever the landlord has released one; why we publish our rents gives the reasoning. The floors below sit in the middle price band of what we list. Each shows its rent before any conversation, which is the standard to hold every advisor to.