If you are about to sign a commercial lease, there is one document that can save you a great deal of money and dispute at the end of it: a schedule of condition. It records the state of the property when you take it on, and without it you can find yourself paying to put right damage that was never yours.
What a schedule of condition is
A schedule of condition is a detailed record — written and photographic — of the exact state of a property at a particular moment, usually just before a lease begins. It documents the condition of the building, inside and out, capturing existing defects, wear and damage so there is a clear, agreed baseline of how the property was when you took it on.
Why it matters for tenants
Most commercial leases contain repairing obligations. In many cases these are “full repairing and insuring” terms, which can make the tenant responsible for returning the property in good condition at the end of the lease. Without a record of how the building was at the start, a landlord can claim for defects and wear that were already there before you ever moved in — and you have no evidence to dispute it. This end-of-lease claim is called dilapidations, and it can run to a serious sum.
A schedule of condition, ideally attached to and referenced in the lease, limits your repairing liability to the condition recorded. Put simply: you cannot be made to hand the building back in better condition than you took it, if you can prove what that condition was.
When to have one done
The time to commission a schedule of condition is before you sign, or at least before you take occupation — while there is still time to reference it in the lease. Done after you have moved in, its value drops sharply, because it can no longer distinguish your wear from what was already there.
Not just for tenants
Landlords benefit too, as do parties either side of neighbouring construction work, where a schedule of condition records a property’s state before nearby works begin in case of later damage claims. But it is commercial tenants who most often wish, too late, that they had one.
Getting it right
The value of a schedule of condition lies in its thoroughness and its detail — a vague record protects no one. It needs to be done properly, by a building surveyor who knows what to capture and how to record it so it stands up if challenged.
At Emerald Ritter we prepare detailed schedules of condition for tenants and landlords across the region. If you are taking on a lease, speak to us before you sign — it is one of the best protections you can put in place.
