Dec. 17 - Bad, bad day.  We were supposed to get final comments from the to-be landlord of our first production location.  Even half-expected to sign the lease today, but no later than tomorrow.  The final comment was “I just found out from my boss that we are going to tear it down in two years.  You may not want to rent it after all.”  WHAT???!!!!

The silver lining was that we didn’t rent it, only to have to move out in less than two years.  As a friend pointed out, many landlords’ M.O. would be to rent it to you anyway.  Good point.  But then, were they telling the truth?

No, they were not telling the truth.  My partner is Chinese and pretty guanxi-nated.  He made a call to somebody who knows somebody much more senior than the people with whom we were dealing.  The word came back: There are absolutely no plans to tear it down. 

It turns out that we could have applied pressure to get them to sign the lease.  However, they could make life hell for us on a day-to-day basis, since somebody at the property level obviously doesn’t like us.  So, there went the better part of two months’ work down the drain.  I had even cancelled a trip to Bali with my wife in order to work on this.