Commercial property lease

About this office lease

This lease should be used to let office space to a single business tenant where there is no requirement for service charge recovery.

This document has been designed to maximise the capital value of the let property and to provide acceptable security to a financial institution. As drawn, the landlord's interest always comes first.

Key features

Plain English is used throughout except where it is necessary to use legal terms expected in this type of contract.

The key features can be summarised as:

• a term between 1 and 30 years, that is, any usual commercial term (short-term by default)
• for long term leases that require registration, prescribed lease clauses (PLCs) can be added easily
• guarantor
• assignment and sub-letting
• break provision
• rent review options
• opt-out of Sections 24-28 of the LTA 1954
• draft authorised guarantee agreement: enables you to use the opt-out provisions of the 1995 Act
• template for a security deposit agreement

This lease is one of a collection of leases designed for use by property professionals: experienced landlords, solicitors and surveyors. Accordingly, the provisions are very thorough.

If you are not familiar with commercial property leases, you may wish to look at the standard version of our office lease agreement. This contains fewer features such as a draft authorised guarantee agreement, fewer landlord's warranties, no references to prescribed lease clauses and no options for sub-letting.

Within the extensive guidance notes, we have provided a discussion on use of security deposit agreement and a template for such.

We have also included the forms required to exclude security of tenure. These include the prescribed notices to be given to the tenant 14 days before the new lease is created, a declaration of a new lease, and the statutory declaration if less than 14 days notice is given.

Similar leases for business premises

If you are letting the office to multiple tenants, this lease allows you to let suites or floors in one building.

If the office is situated on a business park (or you require provisions for service charge recovery), see this lease for units on an industrial estate or a business park.

We also offer a document for a retail unit or shop where the tenant also rents office space within the same building.

The law in this office lease

Commercial lease law is regulated primarily by the Landlord & Tenant Act 1954, amended many times. Account has also been taken of:

• the Landlord and Tenant (Covenants) Act 1995
• the Regulatory Reform Regulations 2003
• the Joint Committee's Code for Leasing Business Premises
• the RICS' Code on Service Charges

In balancing the codes with the law and the landlord's interest, we have tried to comply with the codes but nevertheless, have preferred to protect the landlord as strongly as possible where there may be differences.

Contents

This document is comprehensive in the matters it covers, providing alternative choices for important decisions.

The contents include 28 provisions and 3 schedules covering:

• rent: amount, other payments, interest on overdue rent, periodic review
• condition and repair of the offices
• alterations with landlord's consent
• tenant's positive obligations
• restrictions on tenant
• deliveries and vehicle management
• assignment
• sub-letting
• preconditions for further development
• indemnities by the tenant and warranties by the landlord
• land registration
• security deposit
• insurance
• access for landlord
• guarantor
• termination: default notice by landlord; provision for premature termination
• forfeiture
• security of tenure excluded
• Schedule 1: rights reserved
• Schedule 2: draft authorised guarantee agreement
• Schedule 3: security deposit agreement
• prescribed notices to be sent to tenant to exclude security of tenure

If the term of your lease is for more than seven years, you must register it with the Land Registry. There is no need to do this if the term is shorter.

We provide prescribed lease clauses (PLCs) for long term leases free of charge for download here. There are instructions with them on how to add them to the document.