Commercial Lease Agreement

[Prabhjot Khinda]

My father and his brother currently own a shopping plaza with 6 units. The plaza is currently under a LLC. But now they are thinking of not having a partnership in it anymore. How can my father and his brother equally split the plaza onto their own names or LLCs? What agreement would have to be made? I was thinking of each person having 3 units. I just want to know how this can be done in a nice legal way without any complications. Thank you.

[Stanley Bronstein]

@Prabhjot Khinda Here's my quick, free opinion. Although I'm a lawyer, I'm not your lawyer, so you should seek separate legal advice if you feel you need it.

The bottom line is that they are already in business together and should probably stay that way.

If they were to split things up, they would have to transfer the property out of the LLC into their own names and that would cause problems and cost a lot of money.

Even if they successfully split it up, neither one of them could refinance and it would be difficult to sell the property without the other one agreeing.

They should either keep it in the LLC and live with it, or sell it and split the money and go their separate ways.

What they are proposing would make things more complicated, not less.