I don’t think he actually lost the practice room. The person speaking was not the owner.
If the authority figure has the balls to say 'fine, I'll get your contract terminated' I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if that was exactly the outcome.
The reason is that a lot of people do cave. "Free" wins. If it does not work, they just pretend nothing happened.
Being in the same yacht club as the owner of the building conveys these kind of powers - it's like no one has encountered preferential treatment, good or bad, before.
Few people cave when there are lots of eyes on them., and less people make empty threats with a bar full of spectators - that's why punches get thrown.
Regardless : 'I'm a renter' is by no means a strong argument unless you have a very specifically worded renter agreement -- it's pretty obviously a bad idea to anger the crowd of presumably better paying tenants, what would you do as a land owner, kick out the group every other tenant hates or change policy to protect the small fry?
Nothing. You would do nothing.
You want both to stay, because you also don't enjoy losing any amount of money, and not doing anything is most likely going to get you that.
From the "I'll get you thrown out"-party, it's the same tactic again, directed at the landlord this time. Moving buildings is neither fun nor cheap. Your employees would have to go somewhere else, there might not be anywhere else close by that is convenient to you or as nice/familiar as the place you got, some people might quit over any annoyance this brings too.
Nobody enjoys this shit. There are contracts. There are lawyers. It's never fun to do these things and it can all be dragged out for a long time. Being a somewhat bigger renter is (fortunately) not something that helps you in a court of law.
> Regardless : 'I'm a renter' is by no means a strong argument unless you have a very specifically worded renter agreement
It's a very strong default argument, unless you have a specifically worded agreement, that would strip you of a potential right.