If i walk away from a commercial lease, shut down my corporation, open another corporation

That would depend on a multitude of factors. Will you name the new company similarly to the old? Take the old firm's phone number? Take assets? Take the same clients? Take the inventory of the old? Fail to abide by the corporate formalities? In other words, would someone have a good argument to make that the new corporation is taking assets of the old? If so, then to respond to your question: maybe.

All the questions asked by prior responder are excellent and should show you that this is not an action to be taken lightly. Also, if you are the same person who asked about a personal guaranty, you wont be avoiding that by closing down the corporation. I would suggest consulting with an attorney as soon as you can.

In short you tried to do the asset protection yourself and many of our clients deal with leases, guarantees, and judgments against both themselves individually and their closely held business such as you are referring to here. The clients deal with their businesses’ liability and potential judgment by closing or bankrupting their business. Their common response to how will they continue to work and bring home a paycheck is very similar to your own, such as: “I’ll form a new corporation, LLC or entity or put assets into my spouse's name and just start the new business doing the same thing or practice I always had". In this event your new business as it relates to your current and past creditors is nothing more than a change of your name to the business since you continue to use the same old assets, and goodwill, and tradnames, and phone numbers, and continue with the very same suppliers - therefore the creditor can levy upon the new business as the continuation or alter-ego of the debtor business. It is a clear "red flag" under Transfer in Fraud of Creditor statutes and they can force all of the assets back to the creditor in question. Court decisions already exist finding that the newly formed entity or corporation remains liable for virtually all of the debts of the past closed business of the debtor. One case found that when the principal kept all the former employees, customers, suppliers and operated in the same area this was the consequence. The only sure way would be to file Chapter 7 bankruptcy for the former business. Any assets of the old business, including goodwill, would be part of the bankruptcy estate so that there should be no assets to transfer to a successor venture. Good luck to you, you will need it if you continue on the path you are on. If you find this answer beneficial please mark the thumbs up below.

Yes, the leasing agent can sue you. (anybody can sue anybody). If you do not open a new corporation, you are a sitting duck. Will the leasing agent sue you? Depends on how easy and quickly s/he can relet the premises. Has the leasing agent sued others? Check the court online lawsuits to see. Can the leasing agent prevail? It is fact sensitive. Based on the very limited facts, probably yes if the reason that you are doing it is to avoid the lease.