Does anyone lease a shop on a high street. If so, what sort of initial deposit and lease period are you tied into. Ta

I’ve rented out shop properties for quite a number of years.
The longest lease i have is 15 years but this was asked for by the tenant.Very complex lease that cost around £2000 to draw up.Another lease is 5 years with 3 yearly rent reviews but is fairly basic. I believe longer leases have to be sent to the land registry.
I don’t take deposits but in the lease is the clause that the property has to be returned to its original condition when the tenant leaves.
The question is how long do you want to commit yourself to.If the tenants wanted to break the 15 year lease they would have to pay me a lot of compensation to allow it.
If the landlord provides a complex lease read through it thoroughly.

It’s really up to you and the landlord to agree. If they are struggling to lease somewhere they should be willing to be more flexible, but you need to understand why they are struggling to rent it out.

Check out business rates cost as well. The rateable value of a premises should be on the business rates section of the gov.UK website. Look into small business rate relief and whether that may change with a change of use.

The number of people I meet setting up a business who completely forget potential rates costs is astonishing, especially now cash strapped councils are getting harder with discretionary reliefs.

clause that the property has to be returned to its original condition when the tenant leaves.

reparations costs can be significant. FWIW we left an office building last year, to move in to another over the road, rented from the same landlords, which still cost us ~ 20k to leave. rent was ~ 50k/year.
if we’d have gone elsewhere that number could have easily doubled.
and the new tenants basically ripped out all the suspended ceilings and carpets and started again themselves.

I’m the landlord, but have very little experience of sitting on either side of the ‘rental’ fence. I’ve been approached by an exisitng shop owner accross the road who wants to rent the shop. – I dont want an overly complex agreement, just trying to find a happy medium.