If you are a tenant who has signed a commercial lease, you need to know that you often have substantially fewer rights than residential tenants do. More importantly, the contracts you have signed, which are often what are called “triple-net leases”. give the landlord no responsibility and the tenant all the responsibility. These contracts are voluminous, detailed, and immensely powerful. A local owner of a Hofbrau at the mall off Cleveland avenue himself got involved in an unlawful detainer lawsuit, and based upon violation of the lease agreement, he was eventually evicted.
I predicted his eviction after an important adverse ruling came down from the court, and while I have no opinion one way or the other about the rightness or wrongness of the actions of the defendant or the plaintiff, I often do have an idea what the odds are in a case.
