“China Live is very successful,” Chen told SFGATE. “We’re a very popular restaurant, but at our location right now, we have no lunch business and we’re working our butts off with two-thirds of employee count.” Of the upcoming restaurant Chen said, “I think we’ll pay substantially less rent and have better sales. We’ll be able to do business on a more geographically well-located location and have lunch business.”

The news comes after landlord and property owner 644 Broadway, LLC — managed by Cypress Properties Group — hit China Live with back-to-back unlawful detainer suits beginning in March, followed by another in May over an alleged $3.3 million of unpaid rent the restaurant and emporium owes.

Earlier this month, John Chu, a lawyer for China Live, filed a motion for a relief from default at the Superior Court of California for San Francisco County after he missed a June 6 deadline to file a legal response to the May 24 eviction suit because he was on vacation in Bali. According to a legal filing on July 3, Chu became aware of the error on June 14 and “immediately served and filed the motion to strike.” As the San Francisco Business Times points out, the error could allow the court to rule in the property owner’s favor by default. A hearing is scheduled for Aug. 7.

In a Monday filing, Terry J. Mollica, a layer representing 644 Broadway, LLC, said that Chu’s error wasn’t enough to “justify relief from default” and called the motion to strike it a “delay tactic.” According to the Monday filing, China Live has only so far made two hefty payments toward the backlog of rent, including a partial payment of $894,691.94 made in March for the $1,275,401.72 China Live owed between September 2022 and March 2023. Another partial payment of $13,824.24 was made this year for April and May rents, which accumulated to $358,982 for the combined months (that’s about $179,000 per month). According to the suit, China Live still owes $3.3 million.

“CHINA LIVE rakes in hundreds of thousands of dollars a day through its restaurant operations while not paying any rent to its Landlord,” the Monday filing read. “Just in the 45 +/- days since Chu’s ‘mistake’ occurred, CHINA LIVE has evaded paying monthly rent of approximately $269,450 (calculated at $179,639.12 /month) and has shown no intention of paying anything in the near future.” Mollica added that the lack of rent payments has affected his client.

Chen dismissed the notion that China Live is making vast sums of cash each month. He said that while China Live is making similar financial gains to 2019, his business has struggled since the pandemic. Chen said that his restaurant lost more than $3 million in sales last year.

“Even though we do good business, and we’re much better than we were before COVID, we can’t survive on what they’re claiming that we owe them,” Chen said.

In 2021, China Live accused 644 Broadway, LLC, of a breach of contract for allegedly overcharging rent and overlooking maintenance at the building. A 2021 filing by China Live accused 644 Broadway, LLC, of sabotaging a lease agreement the restaurant had in Seattle by telling a prospective landlord that China Live wouldn’t be able to make its rent. When asked if 644 Broadway, LLC, was damaging prospective lease agreements for China Live, Chen didn’t go into detail but shared that his team has proof that “they tried to prevent us from our expansion because they claimed that we owe all this money.”

Chen told SFGATE that his plan to debut a new China Live site in San Francisco was in part due to the ongoing battle he’s had with the landlord, but he added that he’d like to remain at 644 Broadway, even with a new future site, if he and the landlord can work out a deal, “otherwise we just negotiate a termination.”

“My ultimate hope is to find a resolution that makes sense for both parties,” Chen said. SFGATE reached out to lawyers for 644 Broadway, LLC, but did not hear back by publication.