Landlords with business and retail premises in hard to let areas are offering rentals deals of £1 a year to help retain their tenants and prevent them from being left to pay the business rates.
Boarded up shops are becoming a familiar sight on high streets up and down the UK, and the landlords who own the properties on these run down streets are so anxious to hang onto their existing tenants, that they’re offering rental deals of as little as £1 a year to keep them in their shops.
According to an article by the Financial Times, electrical retailers Dixons, Currys, PC World, and also The Card Factory confirmed that they have similar deals where they pay a nominal rent of £1 a year on a handful of their premises. It’s understood that the bargain basement rental offers were made on sites which are situated in areas of high vacancy rates.
For Landlords, keeping businesses in their retail properties in hard hit areas is a priority because if they vacate the site, the landlord is left to cover the business rates, leaving the landlord out of pocket as the premises is likely to struggle to get re-let.
The high street vacancy rate has risen at a dramatic rate in the last few years, with figures revealing the number of unoccupied retail properties in the UK now stands at 14.3% up from just 4% in 2008 before the credit crunch hit.
