Commercial leases in England and Wales are complex legal documents, not standard agreements. They are typically drafted in the landlord’s favour and often contain clauses that can expose tenants and sometimes landlords to serious financial and operational risk.
Many of the most dangerous provisions are not obvious to non-specialists. Businesses regularly sign leases without fully understanding long-term liabilities that later result in disputes, unexpected costs, or loss of premises.
Our role is to identify those risks before they become problems. One of them is a Full Repairing and Insuring Obligations.
Full Repairing and Insuring (FRI) Obligations
Many leases require tenants to repair and maintain the property regardless of its condition at the start of the lease.
The risk:
Tenants can become liable for major structural repairs — including roofs and external walls — even if the defects pre-dated occupation.
The consequence:
Significant dilapidations claims at lease end, often running into tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds.
How we protect you:
We limit repair obligations, negotiate schedules of condition, and cap exposure wherever possible.
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