CAM audit rights: what most leases actually allow

Most commercial leases give the tenant the right to audit the landlord's CAM numbers, but almost nobody reads that clause until there's already a reason to use it. By then, the window to actually exercise it may already be closing.

How long you actually have

Audit-rights deadlines vary far more than most landlords expect. Some leases give tenants as little as 30 to 90 days after receiving the annual reconciliation to formally request an audit. Others set a window measured in months rather than days, up to 12 to 24 months after the statement, according to LeaseLens. There's no single industry default. Whatever your specific lease says is what actually governs, and it's worth knowing the number before a tenant brings it up first.

Who pays if the audit finds something

Audits aren't free, and most leases spell out who's on the hook for the cost. The tenant typically pays for their own audit, but many clauses shift that cost back to the landlord if the audit turns up an overcharge above a set threshold, often 5%, along with requiring the landlord to reimburse the overage itself, often within 30 days of the finding. That threshold matters: a lease that puts the line at 5% creates a real incentive to get the numbers right the first time, since a material miss ends up costing the overcharge and the audit both.

What this means day to day

None of this is legal advice, and your own lease's specific audit-rights language controls, not any general range quoted here. But the practical pattern holds across most leases: an audit request can arrive with a deadline already running, and the cost exposure depends on numbers that may not have been checked in years. RenewSavvy pulls the audit-rights window and any overcharge threshold directly out of your lease when you upload it, so that clause isn't something you're reading for the first time the week a tenant's accountant calls.