We recently did a translation from French to English of a commercial lease and a tax return from Monaco. Our translator, who is also a Florida-licensed lawyer with significant experience in commercial real estate, reports that while he was performing the translation, his mind wandered from time to time to lovely Monaco. Ah, Monaco!! When it comes to tax havens and playgrounds for the ultra-wealthy, it’s tough to beat Monaco. Pleasant temperatures, plenty of upgrade yachts available, royal glamour, Italy/Switzerland/France at a stone’s throw, and no chance that the government that is helping you shelter your billions today will turn on you tomorrow and send you running. And though our translator is not at yacht level (well, at least not yet), much less upgrade yacht level, and though he did not travel to Monaco for some first-hand “research,” he did learn a bit about the law on commercial leases in Monaco.

Did you know that in Monaco, if a commercial tenant wants to renew a lease, and the landlord refuses to renew, then the tenant is entitled to what amounts to a severance payment? Did you know that commercial leases are subject to a significant annual tax? No wonder they go easy on the income tax! Now, maybe it would have been possible to translate the commercial lease from the French to the English without delving into the law which is implicitly and explicitly a part of the lease. But then, we’d just be translating a word for a word, without providing any context. This makes us no different than a French-English dictionary, and our client did not hire us to act as a dictionary. We were hired to accurately and contextually translate a complex document, so that our translation of that document can be utilized by our client to accomplish its purpose.

If you were to play “what comes to your mind when you hear “Miami”?”, linguistically speaking, you’d say “Spanish”. And while we certainly do our fair share of Spanish to English translation, we are much more than that, just like we’re much more than a dictionary. Visit us at www.transformaonline.com. To request a quote, email us at request@transformaonline.com, or call us at 305-722-3827.