Tenant Advocacy on a Commercial Lease: What We Check When the Draft Arrives

First pass: the draft against the letter of intent

The letter of intent settled the economics in a page or two. The lease restates them across dozens of pages, and a term won in the first can be lost in a definition in the second.

So the first read is side by side: the rent schedule, the free rent months and when they run, the allowance and how it is paid, the base year, the commencement date, the condition the space is delivered in, and each option. Every gap goes back to the landlord's side in one marked list, with the letter of intent cited, and not as a string of separate emails.

Flags in the money terms of the draft

• Fixed escalations above about 3 percent, or expense pass-throughs with no right to audit.
• A base year set earlier than the year you sign.
• An allowance that can be spent only through the landlord's contractor, at rates nobody has stated.
• A security deposit with no schedule for stepping down.
• A duty to restore the space to shell condition at the end of a short term.

Flags in the rights the draft gives or withholds

• Sublet and assignment consent at the landlord's sole discretion, with no deadline to respond.
• A relocation clause that lets the landlord move you within the building.
• Renewal wording too loose to rely on.
• A good guy guarantee with a long notice period or release conditions that are hard to meet.
• Holdover priced at a steep multiple of the rent.

For each flag there are three honest responses: price it, fix it, or walk away. Lease red flags covers the building and process flags as well.

Broker and attorney: who carries which part

The broker argues the business terms from comparable deals and makes sure the draft reflects the letter of intent. The attorney owns the document: default and remedies, insurance and indemnity, the guaranty, the mechanics of assignment, restoration, and every definition that decides what a business term means in practice.

The two should work from one list of open points for as long as the lease is being negotiated. If you have no real estate attorney yet, hire one before the letter of intent is signed, not after the draft arrives.

When to bring a tenant advocate in

The best time is the start of the search, because the letter of intent is where a term costs a sentence to change. Leverage is highest at that stage and falls away at signature.

With a draft already on the table an advocate can still help. Tell the advocate which floors you saw and who showed them, which documents carry your signature, and which terms are already settled on paper. Those three facts set what is still open. What moves in a lease negotiation lists the terms.