The Commercial Lease Clauses New York Tenants Regret Signing
Five provisions that look like boilerplate, are heavily negotiated by anyone experienced, and are almost impossible to fix afterwards.
The Business Desk
Editorial Staff
The Business Desk covers the companies, regulation and tax rules that shape how business is done in New York. Reporting under this byline is produced by the editorial staff of Manhattan Standard and sourced from public record, with sources linked on every article.
Articles by The Business Desk
What It Costs To Open A Restaurant In New York, Itemised
The build-out is the number everyone quotes. The licenses, deposits and pre-opening payroll are the ones that sink people.
Small Business Financing In New York: What Is Actually Available
Beyond the bank that already said no, there are four distinct funding channels most owners never approach.
The Paperwork To Open A Business In New York City, In Order
Formation, federal registration, state tax registration, then the permits specific to what you actually do. Out of order, you wait.
What A New York Business Actually Pays: The Layers Nobody Explains
City tax, state tax, a transit surcharge and a rent tax can all land on the same company. Here is how the layers stack.
How New York's Commercial Rent Tax Works, And Who Still Pays It
A tax that applies to one slice of one borough, catches tenants who have never heard of it, and comes with a credit most eligible businesses never claim.
What A Business Line Of Credit Actually Costs In New York
The headline rate is the smallest part of the number. Here is where the rest of the cost hides.
How A Bank Actually Decides On Your Small Business Loan
Underwriting is more mechanical than most applicants assume. Knowing the order of the checks tells you what to fix first.
What A Merchant Cash Advance Does To A Business
It is not a loan, which is exactly why it is priced the way it is — and why New York now regulates the disclosure.
How A Company Actually Lists On The New York Stock Exchange
The bell is the last five minutes of a process that takes most of a year. Here is the sequence behind it.
What Market Makers Do, And Why It Should Matter To You
Someone has to be willing to trade when you are. That willingness is a business, and it has a price.
How To Read A Quarterly Filing Without A Finance Degree
Four places to look, in order, and what each one tells you that the press release will not.
How New York's Advertising Upfronts Actually Work
A week of presentations in Manhattan sets the terms for a year of television advertising. Here is the mechanism underneath the spectacle.
What A Media Rate Card Actually Means
Published rates are an opening position. Understanding what sits behind them is what makes a negotiation possible.
How A Production Gets Permission To Film In New York
The permit is free. What it buys you, and what it obliges you to do, is where productions get caught out.
How Retail Rent Is Actually Negotiated In New York
The asking rent is one term among many, and it is rarely the one that decides whether the store works.
What A Pop-Up Shop In New York Actually Involves
A short lease does not mean a short list of obligations. Most of the permanent requirements still apply.
How New York Sales Tax Applies To What You Sell
Whether an item is taxable turns on categories that are not intuitive. Getting the category wrong is the retailer's liability, not the customer's.
How To Read A New York Lease Guaranty
The guaranty is a separate contract from the lease, and it is frequently the more dangerous of the two.
What Happens When A New York Business Is Served
The clock starts on delivery, not on the day someone reads it. Most defaults are administrative failures, not legal defeats.
How New York's Courts Are Structured, For Business Owners
Which court hears your dispute shapes the cost, the speed and the expertise applied to it.
How A New York Building Gets Its Electricity Bill
Delivery and supply are two different charges from potentially two different companies. Confusing them costs money.
What Local Law 97 Asks Of New York Buildings
The city set declining emissions limits for large buildings, with penalties for exceeding them. Here is the shape of the obligation.
How To Set Up Utility Service For A New New York Business
Lead times, not paperwork, are what delay openings. Start the process before you need the power.
How A New York Stadium Deal Is Actually Financed
The public contribution is rarely a check. It is usually structured through tax treatment, land and infrastructure.
What A Sports Sponsorship Actually Buys
Rights, not outcomes. Understanding the difference is what separates a working sponsorship from an expensive logo.
How Ticket Resale Is Regulated In New York
New York regulates the resale market rather than banning it. The rules are about disclosure, licensing and what software may do.
Which Licenses A New York Business Actually Needs
Licensing is by activity, not by business type, which is why owners miss requirements.
How To Price A Service Business
Cost-plus pricing guarantees you cover costs and guarantees nothing else.
When To Hire Your First Employee
The obligations that arrive with the first hire are larger than most owners anticipate.
How To Tell Whether A Market Is Worth Entering
Market size is the least useful number in the analysis.
How To Decide What Not To Do
Strategy is mostly subtraction, and subtraction is organizationally unpopular.
What A Competitor Analysis Should Actually Produce
Not a feature grid. A decision about where you will be different.
How To Choose Between Debt And Equity
One is expensive and permanent. The other is cheaper and unforgiving.
What A Lender Actually Reads In Your Business Plan
Not the vision. The assumptions, and whether the downside case still services the debt.
What Grant Funding Actually Involves
Money that need not be repaid, in exchange for obligations that continue for years.
What A Franchise Disclosure Document Actually Tells You
A long, legally required document containing the answers to the questions that decide the investment.
How Franchise Economics Actually Work
You are buying a system and a brand, and paying for both out of revenue rather than profit.
What A Franchisee Can And Cannot Control
Buying a franchise means buying constraints. Knowing which ones bind is the point of diligence.