Two catering businesses in The Hague only have to pay half of their rent during the lockdown, the court in the same city said this week determined. Because it is the first comprehensive judgment in a case about rent reduction, the judgment can have major consequences for other catering businesses, writes The Financial Times.
According to experts who spoke to the newspaper, this ruling makes it easier for other restaurateurs, bar owners and shopkeepers to enforce rent discounts themselves.
The case was brought by a private investor who rents out two properties in The Hague to café owners. The investor went to court because the bar owners were rent arrears and demanded that they be evicted from their premises. The tenants, in turn, said they could no longer pay the rent due to the loss of turnover as a result of the corona crisis.
However, according to the judge, neither the investor nor the café owners could foresee the lockdowns when they closed their lease. Therefore, they have to share the pain fairly. During the lockdowns, they only have to pay half of their rent, and for the period when the cafes had to close their doors earlier in the evening, they receive a rental discount of 25 percent.
“It is a very important signal from the judges”, Dirk Beljaarts, general manager of Koninklijke Horeca Nederland (KHN), said against The Financial Times. However, he does not advise other catering entrepreneurs to pay only part of their rent en masse. That only creates conflict, he says.
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