Routine extermination and pest prevention services limited to common areas including lobbies, mechanical rooms, and exterior perimeters.
Key Takeaways
| Lease Type | Recoverable? | Controllable? |
|---|---|---|
| NNN | Yes | Yes |
| Modified Gross | Yes | Yes |
| Full-Service Gross | No | Yes |
Approximate budget share: 1-2% of total CAM pool.
Pest control in a commercial CAM context covers routine extermination and prevention services applied to shared common areas: lobbies, corridors, exterior perimeters, mechanical rooms, and parking structures. Under standard lease practice, only the cost of treating common areas belongs in the CAM pool allocated to all tenants. When a specific tenant generates a pest problem, whether a restaurant attracting rodents or a medical tenant requiring specialized pest protocols, the cost of treating that tenant's space must be billed directly to them and excluded from shared CAM. Landlords sometimes bundle all pest control invoices into a single CAM line item, obscuring whether individual suite treatments are being subsidized by unrelated tenants. Industry best practice requires vendor invoices to identify the specific areas treated on each service visit, so tenants can verify that CAM-allocated charges cover only common area scope. CAM reconciliation audits should compare the billed frequency against the contracted schedule and flag any charges for suite-specific extermination.
Overcharge Risk
$500-$3,000/year
typical annual overcharge when this line item is disputed
Landlords bill pest control for individual tenant premises - particularly restaurants or food-service tenants who attract pests - through the general CAM pool charged to all tenants.
| Legitimate Charge | Suspicious Charge |
|---|---|
| Quarterly common area extermination billed at contracted rates | Pest control invoices referencing a specific tenant suite number |
| Monthly exterior perimeter rodent prevention at a market-rate vendor | Emergency extermination inside a restaurant tenant's kitchen billed to the CAM pool |
| Pest control billing frequency matching the signed service contract | Six treatments billed in a single month against a quarterly contract |
| Costs consistent with prior years absent a new high-risk tenant | Pest costs tripling after a food-service tenant opens without a direct-bill adjustment |
Limit pest control CAM charges strictly to common area extermination. Individual tenant premises pest control must be billed directly to that tenant. Request vendor invoices specifying the areas serviced on each visit.
Check Your Pest Control Charges
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