Lease Reviewer

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name: lease-reviewer
description: Reviews a lease or leave-and-licence agreement from the landlord's or tenant's side — term and renewal, rent and escalation, maintenance and repair responsibility, security deposit, and exit mechanics — checking first whether the document's own label matches its legal substance, and flagging rent-control or tenant-protection statutes that can override the written terms regardless of what the lease says. Use this whenever a user needs a lease or licence reviewed — including phrasings like "review this lease from the tenant's side", "check the renewal terms in this commercial lease", "does this leave-and-licence agreement actually create a lease", or "what are our exit obligations under this lease". Fires for any lease, tenancy, or leave-and-licence agreement, from either side.
---

# Lease Reviewer

## What this does

Reviews a lease or leave-and-licence agreement from one identified side: term and renewal, rent and its escalation, maintenance and repair allocation, the security deposit, and exit mechanics. It checks first whether the document actually creates what it claims to — a licence that in substance grants exclusive possession for a fixed term can be recharacterised as a lease under some jurisdictions' law, with materially different consequences for possession rights — and it treats rent-control or tenant-protection legislation as a real possibility that can override the written terms, not something the document's own wording can be assumed to settle.

## Before you start

**Which side is being reviewed for — landlord or tenant (or licensor or licensee).** Ask, and do not begin substantive review until confirmed.

**Governing law and the property's location.** Landlord-tenant law is intensely jurisdiction-specific, and rent-control or tenant-protection legislation in many jurisdictions significantly restricts what a lease can actually provide regardless of its written terms. Extract from the document or ask; treat every point resting on such legislation as a verification point rather than an assumption that the written terms will simply be given effect.

**The complete document set** — the lease itself and any schedule, such as a fit-out or service-charge schedule, that qualifies it.

Not blocking, ask once and proceed on what is confirmed: **posture** — negotiation or executed — which gates whether the output produces redlines or a plain statement of consequence.

## Method

**1. Classify the document — lease or licence — and check whether its label matches its actual substance.** A document labelled a licence that in substance grants exclusive possession for a defined term risks being recharacterised as a lease under the law of some jurisdictions, with real consequences for eviction and possession rights. Flag this as a verification point where the substance looks mismatched to the label; do not assert the recharacterisation definitively without legal research.

**2. Read the whole document once before commenting on any single clause.**

**3. Work through term and renewal.** The lease period, whether a renewal is a genuine option the tenant can exercise or requires fresh negotiation with the landlord, and the notice periods required for renewal or non-renewal.

**4. Work through rent and escalation.** Base rent, the escalation mechanism — a fixed percentage or index-linked — payment terms, and any revenue-share or turnover-rent component where the tenancy is commercial.

**5. Work through maintenance and repair responsibility.** The allocation between landlord and tenant, the distinction between structural and non-structural repairs, and service-charge mechanics where they apply.

**6. Work through the security deposit.** The amount, whether it carries interest, the conditions under which deductions can be made, and the refund timeline and mechanics on exit.

**7. Work through exit mechanics.** Termination rights — for breach, and for convenience if any exists — notice periods, make-good or reinstatement obligations, and the consequences of holding over past the term.

**8. Check for statutory overrides.** Rent-control legislation, mandatory notice periods, or tenant-protection statutes can override the written terms regardless of what the lease itself says. Flag this as a verification point specific to the governing law and the property's location; do not assume the written terms control without that being checked.

**9. Grade every issue** using the practice pack's standard three tiers, from the identified side's perspective, and produce redlines and fallback only where the posture is negotiation.

## Output

**1. Parameters.** Side reviewed for, governing law and property location, documents reviewed, posture, date.

**2. Executive summary.**

**3. Lease-versus-licence classification.** Stated plainly, with any mismatch between label and substance flagged for verification.

**4. Term and renewal.**

**5. Rent and escalation.**

**6. Maintenance and repair allocation.**

**7. Security deposit.**

**8. Exit mechanics.**

**9. Issues list.** A table: Ref | Clause | Issue | Effect on the reviewed side | Grade | Proposed change | Fallback. Replace the last two columns with a single Consequence column where the posture is executed.

**10. Points requiring verification.** Statutory overrides — rent control, tenant protection, mandatory notice periods — and the lease-versus-licence characterisation question, under the governing law.

## Do not

Do not assume a document's label — lease or licence — matches its legal substance. Flag a mismatch risk where one appears.

Do not assume the written terms will be given full effect. Rent-control and tenant-protection statutes can override them; flag this as a verification point.

Do not produce negotiating redlines for an executed lease not under negotiation. State the consequence instead.

Do not assume standard notice periods or statutory protections apply. These are jurisdiction- and property-type-specific.