Restaurant lease agreement

About this restaurant lease

This agreement should be used to let a food retail unit such as a restaurant, cafe, delicatessen, or fast food outlet. It may be part of a parade of other shops owned by other landlords, or it may be stand-alone.

The chip shop, restaurant or cafe may have additional space used by the tenant for other business purposes, such as offices or storage.

This is a professionally drawn, very comprehensive lease with massive legal protection for the landlord including a long menu of “do’s” and “don’ts”.

This lease is not a compromise between the interests of the parties. It prefers the landlord’s interest. We think that is the best start point. If you wish to make concessions to your tenant, that is fine, but we want you have those choices.

It includes service charge provisions to provide 100% recovery of service costs.

Similar commercial lease agreements

If the property will be used as a standard shop, use Lock up shop lease agreement or Business lease: shop in parade. The latter contains service charge recovery provisions.

Key features

Plain English is used throughout except where it is necessary to use legal terms common in this field of law.

The key features of this business lease can be summarised as:

• standard guarantor
• options for transfer or assignment to another party
• sub-letting forbidden
• option to include a break clause for premature termination by the tenant
• a choice of options for rent reviews
• schedule covering use of a commercial kitchen

The law in this restaurant lease

Business lease law is regulated primarily by the Lease of Land Act 1969. If the term of this lease is longer than ten years it must be registered at the Deed Registry Office at:

http://www.deeds.gov.za/ITSODeedsWebB/deedsweb/welcome.jsp

Document contents

This restaurant lease is comprehensive, providing alternative choices for important decisions.

The contents include 26 provisions and 3 schedules covering:

• rent: period, amount, other payments, interest on overdue rent, periodic review
• condition and repair
• tenant's positive obligations
• restrictions on tenant: prohibited activities on the property
• signs and advertisements
• assignment of the lease
• indemnities by the tenant
• security deposit
• insurance
• access for landlord
• guarantor
• termination: default notice by landlord; provision for premature termination (a break clause)
• forfeiture
• Schedule 1: rights reserved
• Schedule 2: draft agreement for a security deposit
• Schedule 3: kitchen and cooking equipment