After one of the SoFA District’s largest property owners passed away earlier this year, a six-figure legal dispute over unpaid rent ensued. It ended with the closure of San Jose’s latest nightlife fixture.
Santa Clara County Superior Court officials ruled on July 30 in favor of a lawsuit filed by eviction specialists Rothbard Law Group. It accused Pete Be Center’s 58-year-old namesake founder of withholding one year’s rent between May 1, 2025 and April 30, 2026. Including lawyers’ fees and damages, the court ordered him to pay $439,427.20 and to vacate the property by Tuesday, Sept. 8.
Be, however, said he has no intention of paying a single cent unless he’s allowed to keep running his nightclub at 439 First St. And he has taken to social media to publicly air his grievances against his evictors.
There was a legitimate reason behind the lack of rent payments, Be claimed, citing an undocumented agreement with the property owner before his death.
“This is a hostile takeover at the hands of our new landlords, who also own property down the block,” he said. “I feel like this was orchestrated from the very beginning. Leading up to court, I offered to pay it in full, and they rejected it unless the agreement included me leaving.”
Vacant since the Uproar Brewing Company closed six years ago, the venue’s founder launched the Pete Be Center late last year as the SoFA district’s latest live music hub.
While popular acts like Smash Mouth, Bassnectar and DaBaby drew large crowds in recent months, Be said he waited in anticipation for downtown’s largest privately-owned indoor concert venue to generate funds to pay down the debts he had accumulated during his buildout.
Working with social media influencers and amateur models who gave him the following necessary to host community-organized shows drawing consistent crowds—still he waited.
The venue’s road to profitability was at the center of Be’s alleged agreement with the late property owner Richard Berg. Over the past four decades, the former law professor had assembled a real estate portfolio that includes shoulder-to-shoulder buildings occupied by tenants that include The Studio Climbing, The Ritz, The Guildhouse and a Doordash distribution center. Along the way, Berg enabled the conversion of uses such as thrift stores and adult theaters into now-closed destinations such as F/X, The Usual, South First Billiards, Polly Ester’s, Glo, Pete Escovedo’s and Angels, keeping his properties populated by owner-operators, many of them nightclubs.
Berg was active in branding the then-unnamed SoFA district and recruiting key tenants, including the startup weekly Metro, in which he purchased a 1% ownership interest in the mid 1980s.
“The deal that I had with [Richard] that he would abate our rent payments until we opened. Once we opened, the total back payment would be amortized over 12 months, and we would pay back over the course of 12 months,” he said. “But as soon as he passed away, the son served me with papers, no communication or anything.”
Be said he never entered into a formal agreement with Richard Berg because he didn’t want extra paperwork to burden a man he describes as a grandfather figure.
After inheriting control of his father’s real estate portfolio, Adam Berg disputed Be’s version of events and pointed to a 2023 lease agreement spelling out mandatory monthly rent of at least $27,500.
The dispute dragged out in court over the summer when Pete Be Center saw its most successful period of operation—generating viral moments that racked up millions of views on social media. Violent confrontations at the venue, however, drew police attention.
Despite the career pivot to enter San Jose’s growing entertainment sector ahead of the Super Bowl and World Cup, Be has not escaped his history of legal disputes.
He was sentenced to eight months in Santa Clara County jail in 2010 following four felony fraud convictions for misrepresenting himself to 30 homeowners who placed deposits for solar electrical systems that were never installed. A court also ordered him to pay $178,146 in restitution.
Sitting on the stage of his hollowed-out nightclub a day before the eviction, Be said his last goodbyes to the staff who kept the concert venue running. He pulled out anything that wasn’t nailed down and loaded it into a U-Haul sitting outside.
He has no plans, as of yet, for another music venue, as Be said he will focus energy on countersuing the Berg estate for alleged unpaid utilities fees.
“I’m not rushing into another venue anytime soon—the scars and the wounds are too deep and too fresh,” he said. “I do need to take a little time off to find my sanity.”
