Receiving all the money due under a commercial lease is one of the main concerns for landlords of office spaces. Whether things go awry from the beginning or after a couple of years of the commercial contract running, commercial landlords may sometimes need to look into a number of the various methods of reclaiming outstanding office rent.
The quickest way to reclaim outstanding office rent
Multiple things need to be taken into account before starting any enforcement action against a tenant to reclaim outstanding office rent. The first of them is the landlord's interest to preserve an ongoing relationship with the tenant. If the landlord wants to maintain the agreement that is in place with their tenant then it is advisable to try to reach a short-term payment deal instead of auctioning off seized items to speed up the process.
If you would like to get your property back, in order to start collecting rent from another tenant, then the best thing to do is to forfeit the lease. In this case, you need to pay attention not waive the right to do so by taking any other type of enforcement action. This means that you can only pursue the tenant for the rent arrears once the forfeiture process has been completed.
In some cases, the tenant may be in financial difficulties. It is sometimes worth finding out if there is any kind of formal insolvency arrangement in place. However, keep in mind that this will have an impact on your ability to use other types of enforcement methods.
Using CRAR for reclaiming outstanding office rent
Under the Commercial Rent Arrears Recovery (CRAR) procedure that came into force on the 6th April 2014, you can recover brand barriers by taking control of any goods the tenant has in your property and selling them. Any landlord of commercial premises has the right to exercise this procedure even if the lease does not explicitly mention it.
In order for a landlord to be able to exercise CRAR, a written lease needs to be in place. The building must be completely of a commercial type, which means that it cannot be occupied in whole or part as a dwelling.
This procedure is a suitable solution if the rent is outstanding for more than seven days. If you want to use it, you will instruct an enforcement officer to give your tenants seven days' notice. The tenant can apply for a delay of execution after the enforcement notice is served, but keep in mind that the court order is not necessary to recover rent areas on a commercial lease using the CRAR procedure. In fact, after the enforcement officer has served the seven day enforcement letter and has waited the notice period they can attend the property to remove the tenant’s goods under the Controlled Goods agreement. Through this agreement they can seize items owned by the tenant in order to sell them off at public auction to pay off the outstanding rent.
If you are looking for advice regarding reclaiming outstanding office rent through Commercial Rent Arrears Recovery or by using the forfeiture of lease process. Our enforcement officers have a huge amount of experience dealing with tenants who cannot pay the commercial rent that they owe. Able Investigations can be of help from the start of the process all the way through to the conclusion. Get in touch with us for a suitable solution and advice by calling 0345 366 0000 or fill out our contact form and we will get back to you as soon as we can.
