The expected service life of a building component or asset, used to determine depreciation and amortization schedules. In CAM disputes, artificially short useful lives inflate amortized capital expense pass-throughs.
Useful life for commercial building components follows IRS depreciation tables and industry standards (ASHRAE guidelines for HVAC, ASTM for roofing). When a landlord amortizes capital expenditures over a shorter-than-standard useful life, the annual tenant charge increases proportionally.
A landlord amortized elevator modernization ($250,000) over 7 years rather than the industry-standard 20 years. Tenants paid $35,714/year instead of $12,500/year - an overcharge of $23,214/year.
Request the useful life assumption for any amortized capital item in your CAM. Compare it to IRS Publication 946 or the relevant industry standard. Challenge useful lives shorter than those benchmarks.
Worried about useful life in your lease?
Need to extract lease terms before your audit?
A CAM audit is only as accurate as your lease data. lextract.io extracts 126 structured fields from any commercial lease PDF: CAM definitions, pro-rata share, caps, base year, and audit rights. So you have the exact terms your landlord is supposed to follow.
Go to lextract.ioUpload two PDFs. 14 detection rules. Under 15 minutes. Free.
Find My OverchargesThis page provides general educational information. It is not legal advice and may not reflect the most current law in your state. Consult a licensed attorney for advice specific to your situation.
