small business essentials: Making Your Commercial Lease the Least of Your Worries

Presenter: Samantha Wagner and Nora Walsh

Date: March 16, 2021

Time: 12:00pm – 1:00pm

Location: Online

Commercial leases often contain provisions that business owners (especially new ones) have never encountered. This can lead to headaches, frustration, and occasionally legal fees once an attorney gets involved.

Join Samantha Wagner, attorney for Iowa Legal Aid and Nora Walsh, Commercial Real Estate Advisor at SVN | CREATE for a discussion of practical considerations to think about before you sign a commercial lease agreement to save your future self money, time, and the distraction of dealing with a lease issue while running a business.

About our speaker

Samantha Wagner is a Staff Attorney at Iowa Legal Aid, where she provides legal services and representation to low-income entrepreneurs in both litigation and transactional matters. She previously worked at Texas RioGrande Legal Aid representing survivors of sexual violence. Samantha graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School, and received her Bachelor of Arts from Drake University. She is admitted to practice law in Iowa, Wisconsin, and Texas. Samantha has extensive experience working with immigrants and works to provide culturally-competent and creative solutions to clients’ legal issues. In her free time, she works to destigmatize mental health, especially for the legal profession, and serves as a cultural ambassador for the Midwest.

Nora Walsh moved from the suburbs of Chicago to attend the business school at Drake University and graduated in the Spring of 2016 with an Integrated Marketing Communications and Direct & Interactive Marketing major and Information Systems minor. Her family background in Commercial Real Estate in the Des Moines and Chicagoland areas spiked her interest in the industry at a young age and gave her the enthusiasm for real estate that she has today.

After working actively for two years in residential property management, Nora fell in love with Iowa and decided to make the transition to become an active Iowa REALTOR® and ICREA member. She joined the CREC IOWA team in 2018 and hopes to bring a strategic, yet personable approach to the commercial buying and selling process.