A step-by-step CAM reconciliation checklist for reviewing landlord annual expense statements and verifying charges against lease terms. This checklist walks through the full reconciliation process from obtaining the statement to issuing payment or dispute notices. It covers expense inclusion/exclusion verification, cap calculations, and audit rights.
By Angel Campa, Founder · Updated March 2026
Used by property managers, tenant representatives, and lease accountants during the annual CAM reconciliation process, typically between January and April of each year for the prior calendar year.
Lextract automatically extracts these fields from your lease PDF — eliminating the manual data collection underlying this checklist.
Most leases require tenants to dispute CAM statements within 60-180 days of receipt. After this window closes, the statement is typically deemed accepted even if charges are improper. Always identify and extract the audit rights and dispute period from your lease abstract before the reconciliation statement arrives.
The most commonly disputed items are management fees (charged above the contractual cap), capital expenditures included as operating expenses, expenses for areas outside the tenant's defined CAM pool, and above-market contractor charges for affiliated vendors. Having the exclusion list clearly extracted in your lease abstract is essential for effective disputes.
A CAM cap limits the annual increase in controllable operating expenses. A non-cumulative 5% cap means each year's controllable CAM cannot exceed the prior year's controllable CAM by more than 5%. A cumulative cap means unused capacity from prior years accumulates — giving the landlord more upside in later years. Non-cumulative caps are significantly more favorable to tenants.
Well-negotiated leases exclude: capital expenditures, leasing commissions, depreciation, financing costs, management fees above a specified percentage, expenses for vacant space, above-market wages for on-site employees, and costs for other tenants' build-outs. The specific exclusion list is extracted and stored in the cam-exclusions field.
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A step-by-step guide to auditing a commercial landlord's annual CAM reconciliation statement, including the most common overcharges and how to identify them.
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