Another one bites the dust

I decided to drive around a strip mall area that is in the middle of nowhere. I used to work down the road and thought there might be something there. I saw a space that had brown paper covering the window (good indication nothing was there) and took down the agent's name from the lease sign. We called him up and the place was supposed to have been a deli but the renter's financial backing fell through. So, it had plumbing and a partial hood and a monsterous 19' walk in refrigerator that was partially complete. The space was a closer match to my needs than most of the other spaces I've seen, so I had my builder come for an estimate to do the build out. It was really high - $125,000 but we had to put in an ADA bathroom and erect some walls. My builder is really conservative so I discounted the price a bit too. We started the LOI process yet again and the current renter came back with a counter. Something smelled a little fishy - his last line said that as of 4/30 he was no longer financially responsible for the space. Hummm.. we smelled bankruptcy. We talked to the owner and he countered with the most outrageous offer I've seen. He wanted 3 months rent as down payment (normal is first and last), 4% yearly increases (normal is 3%) and required that he and the current renter figure out the terms of getting the renter out of his lease before he would let me in. Way too many variables in this one and his cost per square food was unacceptable. He would not budge. I backed out of that one.

I don't know how my agent puts up with this. He is my best cheer leader but even he is getting tired. I decided to give up on my biggest client's request - something close to downtown with at least 2,000 sq. ft. I've been looking for 6 months and haven't found anything so I'm expanding my area. We've now found a strip mall with a restaurant that is going out of business but isn't on the market yet. Also, dear old Fred (remember Fred? Guy with perfect place that sold the building?)... The financing on Fred's deal fell through. Now he wants to rent out the whole building which will be tough given the bottom half is a restaurant and the top half is offices. However, Fred has found someone very interested in the offices on the top floor. Perfect, right? My agent is going to try and pressure the 'very interested' guy to see if the office space can be settled on so I can have the bottom.

Stay tuned. I'm going to get this one day!