Body of evidence

Over coffee with one of our regular correspondents last week, the discussion turned to rent reviews, and the fact that his business faces one on a store in a high-profile location in the near future.

Another of our regular correspondents, John Corcoran, works tirelessly to highlight the iniquity of upward only rent reviews, but it was another aspect of the system which was exercising my companion, which is the disclosure of rental evidence.

When a market is moving in the landlords’ favour they’re more than happy to use evidence of deals which they’ve done to demonstrate how the rental tone of the area has risen. But when the market is moving in the direction of the tenants, I’m told it’s becoming increasingly common for deals to include non-disclosure agreements so that the rent remains a secret between the landlord and retailer.

That doesn’t prevent the rents being disclosed if required at arbitration, but wouldn’t it be better if information was freely available so that both sides can have all the relevant information without the need for costly and time-consuming mediation processes?

It’s especially an issue for small retailers without big property teams to handle the discussions, and unless they have their ear to the ground on what deals are being agreed, many won’t be willing to call their landlords’ bluff and challenge their interpretation of what rents should be. An open market review should be just that, with details of all deals freely available to both sides.