Rita is a high achieving student who studies very hard. Rita scored high marks in her law exams and won prize money for achieving the highest marks in all of her business law courses, including company law and tax law. Rita is passionate about her studies and she wants to use her knowledge to set up her own business as a professional business consultant. Rita, however, does not have enough funds to do so. Commercia property in Sydney is expensive to buy or to rent. Luckily for Rita, her uncle in Sydney, Mr Chorwala, has a vacant store which he is happy to rent to her. The store has been vacant for over 12 months and her uncle is desperate to rent out the store and to receive some rental income. He agrees to lease the store to Rita for three years at a discounted rent. She is happy to accept this generous offer. The store owned by Mr Chorwala was previously used as a restaurant specialising in Asian food. The store has a very large oven fixed to the wall. The store is not suited for any other purpose unless renovations are made to convert the store for use for other business purposes. Despite this, Rita quickly worked out that it will still be cheaper for her to renovate the rental store and to lease it than to seek another rental store elsewhere in Sydney. Before starting with renovations to the store, Rita asked Mr Chorwala for a copy of the lease document which she signed immediately. Mr Chorwala said to Rita that he will sign the lease agreement later as there was no rush to do so. He handed over the store keys to her. Meanwhile, Rita got a few quotations from builders to renovate the interior of the store so that it can be used to conduct her business consultancy practice. The average quote for the renovations received by Rita was in the amount of $55, 000. Luckily, she has some personal savings and was able to borrow the rest of the money from her friends to pay for this large renovation expense. Rita reminded her uncle to give her a copy of the lease document after he had signed it. Mr Chorwala said to Rita "But why the rush? We are family. We have the same blood. Go ahead and do what you have to do to improve the rental store." Rita picked the cheapest quote for the renovations and then went ahead and paid the builder $40, 000 after the renovation work at the rental store was finished. 2 A month later, after her conversation with her uncle and the completion of the alteration work, Rita still has not received the signed lease document from her uncle. After further requests, Mr Chorwala said to Rita "All lease documents have to be signed to be legal binding. There is no signed lease document by me, therefore there is no contract. I am going to offer this rental store to Mr Lotto who is prepared to pay me three times the rent. Return the store keys immediately. See you later." Rita is shocked and dismayed. Rita knows from her law studies that all lease documents have to be signed by both parties to be binding. Rita is unhappy to hear this news and at the fact that she had just spent $40,000 to renovate the rental store. With reference to relevant principles of contract law and relevant precedents studied in this course, advise Rita of her legal rights