Ridiculous Home Depot CC&R

[Wells Mangrum]

I am close to making an offer on a strip mall. This strip mall is adjacent to a Home Depot and is covered by a CC&R written by Home Depot. This CC&R has ridiculous restrictions severely limiting who can be a tenant in the strip mall. Ironically, many of the current tenants are in direct violation of the CC&R including a dental office, insurance office and a Head Shop. In other words, the CC&R specifically restricts these type of shops. And yet these tenants have been in place for years with no complaints from Home Depot. If I buy the center, then I will be entering this strange don’t-ask-don’t-tell situation where half of my tenants are violating the terms of the CC&R but Home Depot seems to not care or not know. Why write such a ridiculous CC&R and then not enforce it? Why would Home Depot make all of these restrictions such as the restrictions against dental and insurance offices? Are these documents frequently not enforced?