Bubble tea shop-takeover due diligence checklist - licenses and lease, equipment and drains, platform accounts, real sales - walked through in the three days before signing, with a walk-away signal on every line

You are an opening consultant for the bubble tea
trade. I am taking over a transferring shop and have
three days of site access before signing. Give me a
due-diligence checklist organized by day, each
item stating what to check, how, and what result is
a stop (renegotiate or walk).

Day 1 - licenses and lease (decides whether this
deal is possible at all):
- Business license and food permit: ask whether
  they transfer to my name by amendment or must
  be refiled, and roughly how long - the local
  regulator's counter is the authority; this
  checklist tells you to go ask with documents
  in hand, and never recites the rules itself
- Lease, four reads: remaining term / annual
  escalation clause / whether transfer requires
  the landlord's written consent / renewal
  preference at expiry. Vague or stonewalled on
  any one: stop.
- Meet the landlord in person: cross-check the
  rent and any transfer-fee split against what
  the seller told you - two stories that do not
  match: stop
- Last three months of utility bills: arrears,
  and whether water usage plausibly matches the
  claimed volume (a suspiciously small water
  meter does not square with "400 cups a day")

Day 2 - equipment and site (decides how much more
money goes in):
- Power on every machine: sealing machine, ice
  maker, tea brewer, fridges and freezers, water
  boiler, water filtration - running is only the
  first gate; copy the manufacture year off each
  nameplate
- Ice maker and filtration consumables: any
  record of the last filter change - no record
  means budget an immediate replacement, full
  stop
- Drains and floor: ask whether tea sludge has
  ever blocked the pipes; look at the floor
  drains and grease trap as they are - a shop
  with a blocking history may spend its first
  reopened month on a plumber
- Equipment ownership: which machines are rented
  (water filtration most often) - rentals do not
  transfer; they mean a new contract and another
  monthly bill

Day 3 - the business itself (decides whether it is
worth the price):
- Sales records: demand three months; read the
  trend and mix (delivery share, weekday vs
  weekend) - only one week offered: stop
- Delivery platforms: rating, negative reviews
  sorted by keyword (slow service / quality /
  attitude), and whether the storefront can
  transfer with the shop or must reopen as a
  new store - if it cannot transfer, value the
  "regulars" as starting from zero
- Sit through two rush hours (afternoon and
  evening): count actual walk-ins and pickup
  riders; cross-check against the sales records
- Staff: any unpaid wages, who would stay - a
  shop with a permanent "hiring" sticker on the
  door gets one question first: why

Output format:
- One section per day, one row per item:
  item / how to check / the stop signal
- A closing block, "must be in hand before
  signing": landlord's written consent to the
  transfer, three months of sales records,
  equipment list with ownership (owned or
  rented), originals of licenses checked
  against copies - missing any one, do not sign

Constraints:
- No valuation opinion - "what is this shop
  worth" is answered by the person who finished
  the checklist, not by the checklist
- No reciting statutes, deadlines, or processing
  times - license questions resolve at the local
  counter, and a misquoted rule would be this
  checklist's fault
- No negotiation tactics - the checklist ends
  at seeing clearly; price is settled at the
  table

Why it is written this way

Organized by day rather than by theme because the binding constraint of due diligence is what is available when: the regulator's counter keeps daytime hours, the landlord meets in the evening, and rush hours only happen twice a day. A theme-grouped checklist reads cleanly and falls apart in execution - day-one items and day-three items interleaved means nothing actually gets done in order. A time-ordered checklist is the only kind you can walk.

A stop signal on every line is what separates due diligence from a sightseeing visit. Collect a pile of documents with no line saying how bad is too bad, and the decision reverts to gut feel at the signing table - without hard thresholds, the walkthrough becomes theater and confidence comes from self-consolation. "Landlord stories mismatch: stop" and "one week of sales only: stop" are precisely the spots where buyers talk themselves out of their own evidence.

The delivery account gets its own full item because it is what "the regulars" actually live on: the rating, the review history, the repeat customers - all hang on the account, and if it cannot transfer, the buyer holds a nicely decorated empty shell while a meaningful slice of the transfer fee was paid for exactly that shell. Leave this unchecked and the price negotiation has no anchor.

No valuation, no haggling coaching, by design. The checklist's product is facts; the moment the model starts deriving a "fair discount" from the defects it found, it is doing the one job the buyer must do alone. After the checklist, the buyer will have a number - the model's number would only dilute it.

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