Reaffirmations: A Guaranteed Good Idea

When landlords negotiate amendments or extensions of leases with existing tenants, it can be easy to overlook a very simple but important part of the documentation process: the reaffirmation of an existing guaranty of lease.
 
A reaffirmation of guaranty from a guarantor of the tenant's obligations under a lease can be as simple as a few sentences appended to the end of the lease amendment, whereby the guarantor certifies that it consents to the terms and conditions of the amendment, and affirms that its obligations under the guaranty remain in full force and effect.

Without such a reaffirmation, if the tenant defaults and the landlord needs to enforce the lease guaranty, a guarantor may be able to raise a defense to such enforcement by claiming that the modifications in the amendment are so material that they go beyond the scope of the obligations under the original guaranty, and that the guaranty did not extend to the tenant's obligations under the lease as