Hunton Retail Law Resource

When developing a retail shopping center, landlords have a vision for what that shopping center will look like. This vision comes to life as the shopping center is leased up and tenants open for business. In order to preserve that vision, and ultimately the marketability of the shopping center, landlords will craft permitted use, prohibited use and exclusive use concepts into their leases to ensure that the shopping center occupants continue to operate in the shopping center throughout the term of their leases in accordance with the landlord’s vision.

As our nation transitions into a “post-pandemic world,” consumers are now more than ever looking for new and convenient ways to get quality healthcare services. So much so that a 2020 survey conducted by ICSC[1], a trade group of retail property owners, found that almost 7 out of 10 adults visit a healthcare provider in a shopping center or outdoor strip mall. The movement coined as “medtail” is a growing trend across the nation where healthcare providers are moving from the large traditional community hospitals into more convenient retail spaces. The rise of medtail, coupled with the growth of online shopping and the ever decreasing need for brick and mortar retail locations, has many landlords now considering healthcare service providers as tenants in their retail location. Adding healthcare services to a retail center provides many benefits, but landlords should keep these few things in mind as they look to repurpose their traditional retail space.