The date the landlord grants the tenant physical access to the space.
By Angel Campa, Founder · Updated March 2026
The possession date determines when the tenant can begin build-out work, which affects the entire project timeline from construction to store opening. If the landlord delivers late, it may trigger rent abatement extensions, delay damages, or even termination rights depending on how many days late delivery occurs. Tracking this date is essential for coordinating contractor schedules and grand opening plans.
Found in the "Term" or "Delivery of Possession" section. May be the same as the commencement date or may precede it to allow for pre-commencement construction access. Sometimes defined in a separate early access agreement.
Lextract uses a combination of AWS Textract OCR and Claude AI to identify and extract the possession date from your lease PDF. The AI searches for all pages of the document, then assigns a confidence score based on OCR quality and extraction certainty. Fields with lower confidence are flagged for human review.
Execution Date
The date the lease agreement was fully signed by all parties.
Commencement Date
The date the legal term of the lease officially begins.
Rent Commencement
The date the tenant is legally obligated to begin paying base rent.
Expiration Date
The date the lease term naturally concludes without renewal.
Lease Term (Months)
The total duration of the initial lease term expressed in months.
Free Rent Period
The duration during which the tenant is excused from paying base rent.
Not always. The landlord may grant early access for the tenant to begin construction before the lease term officially starts. In those cases, the possession date precedes the commencement date, and the tenant may occupy under a separate early access agreement.
Most leases provide a grace period (30-90 days) before the tenant can exercise remedies. After that, the tenant may be entitled to rent abatement, extended free rent, or in extreme cases, the right to terminate the lease entirely.
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