Landlord Tenant Law

In attempts to alleviate the impact of job losses and business disruption due to COVID-19, state and local governments have passed emergency orders and regulations temporarily prohibiting evictions and extending deadlines to pay rent, among other restrictions. When those restrictions are lifted, there is no guarantee that they will have done more than delay the inevitable: eviction and bankruptcy.

Not including what may have been negotiated in a commercial lease, there are three traditional theories under which commercial tenants could seek to assert entitlement to forgiveness of their rent: frustration of purpose, impossibility of performance, and force majeure.

National Association of Realtors Survey Shows Most Commercial Tenants Struggling to Pay Rent While the residential real estate market is experiencing what appears to be a swift rebound from the coronavirus-induced slump, the commercial landscape still looks relatively bleak.

Several members of Commercial Leasing Law & Strategy's Board of Editors and contributors to Law.com and our ALM sibling GlobeSt.com took part in a Twitter chat on "Do We Need Offices Anymore?"

This article focuses on a recent decision upholding a pipeline developer's exercise of eminent domain under New York law in National Fuel Gas Supply Corp. v. Schueckler.

Condemnee Entitled to Consequential Damages To Contiguous Parcel Valuation for Prospective Use Rejected

Many in the legal economy may be asking themselves whether they need office space at all now that everyone has been forcibly migrated to cyberspace. But having experienced work from home for several months, there is a newfound appreciation for the office workplace. But what will the office look like when we return to it?

To say the least, for those companies that filed for bankruptcy on the eve of the COVID-19 shutdowns, the strategies — and available cash flows to pay landlords — did not go as planned.