When lease expiries pile up in January

Owners remember the tenant who complains. They forget the three quiet apartments whose terms end in the same fortnight. In Tbilisi that fortnight is often January or early February, when nobody wants to move and nobody wants to heat an empty floor.

We draw lease calendars because a list sorted by tenant name hides the cluster. Sorted by date, the band is ugly and useful. A shop on the lane plus three flats is not “the baker’s problem.” It is a heating problem, a caretaker problem, and a conversation that needed to happen in October.

Tacit renewals confuse the plate. A lease that continues until someone writes a letter is not an expiry; it is a different animal and should be labelled as such. Painting it as a hard date to make the calendar look decisive is how briefings turn into arguments.

If you only commission one thin piece of work this year, and you already trust your rent roll, commission the calendar. It is the cheapest way to see whether winter will empty a floor while you are still talking about a single shop.