sub renting to a .....

[janie1963]

I'm renting a huge lot (over an acre) for my drive thru and have been approached by the landowner to sub rent a parcel of the lot to a fruit stand. The fruit stand had been just down the road from my location, so they are somewhat established in the area and seem to be nice enough people. The landowner has left it up to me to draw up a rental agreement and I'm not sure what to charge for monthly rent. Would half of what I'm paying be fair? At their last location they paid their own power and water plus 10% of daily sales. We overheard them talking about paying my landlord 20% of sales. I really prefer a flat monthly rent rather than a % of daily sales. It's also a big plus for me being that I'm just starting out and don't know what my sales will be like, so having someone pay part of my rent for the first few months would be nice. I also have the feeling that they want/expect to use my water and power hook up and I'm not keen on that idea...too hard to determine how much to charge them, etc. Also I don't need them draining my resourses. Besides, I've worked long and hard trying to get my business going and have been working with the county every week....why should they be able to come in and not have to go through all the channels/hurdles that I worked so hard to get through? It seems that I've got the upper hand here...without me they won't have a location because I get the feeling they can't afford the rent on their own. They also mentioned putting my name on their homemade signs and I'm in the process of having very nice, professional and expensive signs made....so in the agreement I've said they can't do that. I've put everything I could think of in the agreement, but thought someone else might have more ideas.
Sorry for the length of this-it's just a new situation for me and I'm not the type to jump into anything without much consideration (that's probably why I didn't call the fruit people by the end of the week like they wanted.)

 

[EspressoOutfitters]

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[EspressoOutfitters]

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[janie1963]

I think the codes are more lenient with fruit stands...the way they talked, they didn't have to have water, but wanted it.

We're struggling with the mop sink issue ourselves: our building is 8x16 with the restroom taking up one end(I think it's 4x8). The health officer said we could put a small plastic mop sink in the restroom. In my opinion, we won't have much floor space to mop and a dirty old mop sloshing around will be less sanitary than one of the newer mops, such as a Swiffer. She's allowing us to have 2 sinks side by side in the work area rather than the 3 compartment system...as long as one is for hand washing only and if we have another hand sink in the restroom. The mop sink is causing a plumbing heaache for my husband(he's out now special ordering some sort of fitting that no one has heard of). So I think I'll call the health officer today to ask about getting rid of the mop sink.

Wish me luck!!!

 

[topher]

not to be a pain...but I would double check on the 3 compartment sink...one is for washing, another for rinsing and 3rd for sanitizer. I have never heard of not having to have a 3 compartment sink...and I have worked in some po-dunk areas!!

 

[EspressoOutfitters]

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[Coffee Guy]

Yeah, I have to agree with both topher and espresso-outfitter, it is a health department requirement to have a 3 compartment sink for cleaning utinsels. However, you can get a commissary letter and have it off site.

 

[janie1963]

I don't know what the fruit stand folks will encounter and that'll be up to them to find out. They gave me the impression that they thought they'd just go in and renew last year's permit. I'm quite sure it won't be so easy but then again.........

As for me, I spoke with the health officer yesterday. She said we could put a mop sink outside if we want to and after talking for a few minutes she said if we wanted to forget about the mop sink and use another mopping system thats fine with her as long as the building guy doesn't mind...he's a very cool guy and has been very helpful to us so far. She asked me to write a letter to her explaining our conversation and to ask for a variance on the mop sink.

Obviously my "it never hurts to ask" attitude is well worth it. In our county code book it does say over and over," at the health ofiicer's discretion". I've seen an example of King County's health codes and they are a bit different than ours. We've paid nearly $500 for county permits and review fees, but the permit fee for an espresso operation (without seating) is only $80 per year.