COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE : Booklet Offers Assertiveness Training With Its 327 Questions to Ask Landlord

“OK, potential landlord, sit down. We have 327 questions for you to answer before we’ll even consider renting your space.”

That’s how Newport Beach real estate consultant and writer B. Alan Whitson believes the commercial leasing business should be run--by the tenants. He recently published a booklet spelling out the suggested interrogation: “327 Questions to Ask Before You Sign a Lease.”

For example, there’s question Number 96: “Would there be any increase in insurance costs due to another tenant’s ‘particular use’?”

In other words, if the landlord put a restaurant in a wood-frame strip shopping center previously occupied only by stores, would the shop owners have to help pay the increase in fire insurance coverage?

“They shouldn’t have to--the restaurant should pay all of it, because the restaurant would be the fire hazard,” Whitson said. “You need to get things like that in writing. Not all landlords are saints.”

Or question Number 9: “Is the landlord required to complete or correct the ‘punch list’ items within 30 days?”

A punch list, Whitson explained, is a survey of problem spots--such as a malfunctioning light fixture--that the landlord has promised to repair. “If it’s not fixed quickly, chances are you won’t be able to get (the landlord) back inside the building,” he said--unless, of course, you get one of the saints.

And even if you have a great landlord today, he may sell out to an unknown quantity tomorrow, Whitson said: “Your next landlord might be Attila the Hun.”