We have had a good tenant in our back bay for about ten years. Last year, he sold his company and the new tenant became a problem, three late payments and a bounced check. He also violated several other requirements of his lease. So when it came time to renew, I told him we could only give him a one year lease. He decided to get lawyers involved. Once you get lawyers involved, I don’t want to do business with you, so we began eviction proceedings. They lost quickly but we gave them enough time to find a new location with the requirements that they pay the rent on time and leave the facilities in “broom swept ready condition”. They did not. They owe us about $15,000 in unpaid rent and clean up costs so we are in the middle of a new legal action.

The good news is we have decided to convert that bay into a dedicated paint area which will about triple the space currently used. We will be installing a new state of the art automotive style paint booth and dedicated prep areas which should help with our efficiency. Painting can be a bottleneck for production. We also had our sign replaced to delete the tenants name and replace it with “Cutline is King”.