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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am the pp who is the investor in the restaurants. So many people on here clearly have never owned a smaller business before. Depending on how you count what is a business I own about 6-8.

Business 101 is that a business has to be in the black at all times. If it is isn’t the owner needs to adjust something to get into the black and so fast. Businesses that run in the red will fail.

If the restaurant pays its employees while shut down it will fail. If it spends the cash it has on rent for the next few months it will fail. The right strategy is definitely to go into crisis mode, pay absolute necessary expenses only and sort it out with everyone else later.

So strange so many people on here are concerned about the landlord. I’m surprised but hopefully pleasantly so. I own commercial properties throughout the areas with about 25 retail tenants. I expect those in the restaurant or other affected areas to call us and tell us the same thing. We’ll sort it out later. In my restaurants I intend to pay back the landlord. Maybe spread out over 12-36 months. No penalties and no interest. Frankly if my tenants made that same offer I’d jump in it.

As to the commercial landlord who says he is keeping notes. If  you are more focused on a tenant paying you next month than their ability to survive and pay you in perpetuity you will have a lot of vacant properties in a few months time.   I actually have a hard time imagining that you really are a retail tenant landlord. There are times to be a dick and there are times to work it out with tenants. I’m surprised you don’t know the difference.

And as to the posters asking why a restaurant doesn’t carry 6 months of all expenses in hand, you should know that restaurants net 4-8% of revenues. And also that savings held In The business are taxed to the owner the same as if the owner pocketed the money. Which means to accumulate 6 months expenses after taxes would take a restaurant roughly 8-16 years to accomplish. [/quote]

Commercial landlord PP here. Your original post is not nearly as reconciliation as you sound now. You essentially typed that you were going to not pay your landlord because "what are they going to do, not like another restaurant or anyone is looking at leasing space right now". In other words, your intention is to be difficult not because you can't pay, but because you've decided to take advantage of the situation. We look for tenants with whom we can develop some level of mutual trust and respect. A tenant that takes advantage of us like this is not a tenant we want to accommodate on future improvements, or lease rates negotiations. When times are hard, we want to see that tenants are doing the best they can to meet their obligations. If they truly have difficulty, we'll work with them on a payment deferrement. We've agreed to waive rent in the past and will likely do the same for some tenants this time around. To be sure, the kind of tenant we provide flexibility to will not be the ones who are obviously taking advantage of us, like you characterized in your first post.

Lastly, all I said is that we would take notes and act appropriately in the future, not that we would play hardball with a dishonest tenant right on the spot. We'd push to get what we can, take notes, and plan for the future. Again, the customer always pays for everything, and we are always smiling. 
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