Office lease checklist: what to check before you sign your first office lease

The order to check things in

A lease deal moves through stages, and each one is a chance to find a problem while it's still cheap to fix. Here are the checks we suggest at each stage.

The architect's part is mostly at the start: will the floor take your team, and what will it cost to make it work? Your solicitor's part is mostly at the end. The heads of terms sit in the middle, and they're where a commercial agent or surveyor acting for you earns their fee.

Before you view: know what you need

You can't judge a floor without knowing what you need it to hold. Before you book viewings, write down how many people will be in on your busiest day, the meeting rooms and support space you need, and how that may change over the lease. Our guide to how much office space you need sets out the method, and how to write an office fit-out brief turns it into a document agents and landlords can work from.

At the viewing: what's actually there

Lawful use. In England, offices fall within Class E(g)(i) of the Use Classes Order: "Offices to carry out any operational or administrative functions." Most office buildings will already have this use, but ask, and ask whether any planning conditions limit how the space can be used. This matters more if you're looking at a building that wasn't built as offices.

The EPC rating. Under the Energy Efficiency (Private Rented Property) (England and Wales) Regulations 2015, the minimum energy efficiency standard, or MEES, has applied to all privately rented non-domestic property since 1 April 2023. A landlord can't continue to let it with an EPC rating below E unless a valid exemption is registered. Ask for the EPC. If the rating is F or G, ask whether an exemption is on the PRS Exemptions Register, which the public can search. Ask too whether the landlord plans energy works during your lease, and how they'd affect you.

Cat A or shell? Cat A is the landlord's base finish, typically ceilings, floors, lighting and basic building services. Cat B is your own fit-out: partitions, meeting rooms, kitchen, furniture, IT and brand. What counts as "Cat A" varies by building and by lease, so check what's actually there. A floor let in shell condition costs much more to make usable.

Services. Ask about heating and cooling, ventilation, power, data connections and opening hours. A floor that suits 20 people may struggle with 40 on the same plant.

Does your brief fit? Ask for the floor plans and get a quick layout of your brief drawn on them: a test-fit. It's the fastest way to see whether the floor works before anyone negotiates terms.

Heads of terms: where most of the deal is set

Heads of terms are a short summary of the main commercial terms, agreed "subject to contract" before solicitors draft the lease. Once they're agreed, it's hard to reopen them.

The RICS Code for leasing business premises (1st edition) is a professional standard for RICS members who advise on business lettings in England and Wales. Its stated aim is to improve the quality and fairness of lease negotiations and to promote comprehensive heads of terms. It says heads of terms should be in writing and should cover, among other things:

• the premises, including their extent, and any rights you'll have;
• the length of the term, any break rights or renewal rights, and whether the 1954 Act will apply or be excluded;
• any guarantor or rent deposit;
• the rent, whether it includes business rates, and whether VAT will be charged on it;
• any rent-free period or other incentive, and how and when the rent will be reviewed;
• the service charge and insurance;
• whether you can assign or sublet;
• your repairing obligations;
• permitted use, alterations and reinstatement at the end of the lease, and any initial alterations or fit-out.

If one party has no professional adviser, the Code says they should be told about it and recommended to get professional advice. Take the advice.

Break clauses. A break clause lets you (or the landlord, or both) end the lease early, on set dates. For a growing company, it can be the most valuable term in the lease. Check the dates, how much notice you must give and any conditions attached to the break, and ask your solicitor what each condition means in practice. A conditional break you can't meet is no break at all.

Security of tenure: is the 1954 Act in or out?

Part II of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 gives most business tenants in England and Wales the right to ask for a new lease when theirs ends. That right is in sections 24 to 28. Landlord and tenant can agree to exclude it, which is called contracting out, but only for a lease for a fixed term, and only by following a set procedure.

Under section 38A of the Act and Schedule 2 of the Regulatory Reform (Business Tenancies) (England and Wales) Order 2003:

• the landlord must serve a warning notice on the tenant, in the prescribed form;
• if it's served at least 14 days before you sign the lease or become contractually bound to, you make a simple declaration that you've received it and accept the consequences;
• if it's served less than 14 days before, you must make a statutory declaration instead;
• a reference to the notice and the declaration must be endorsed on, or included in, the lease.

If the steps aren't followed, the agreement to contract out is void. For you, the practical point is simpler. With a contracted-out lease, you have no statutory right to stay when it ends. If you want to stay, you'll need to negotiate a new lease, so plan your next move or your renewal talks well ahead.

Repair, dilapidations and the schedule of condition

GOV.UK puts the basic point plainly: when you move out, the repairs you need to make "are called 'dilapidations' and should be written in the lease." It adds: "Any responsibility that is not mentioned in the lease will usually be yours as the tenant."

So read the repairing covenant carefully. Depending on its wording, it can require you to put the premises into repair, not just hand them back as you found them. The usual protection is a schedule of condition: a written and photographic record of the state of the premises when you take them, agreed with the landlord and attached to the lease, so your repairing obligation is limited to that condition. We'd always recommend one for an older floor.

At the end of the lease, the landlord may serve a schedule of dilapidations. Under the Dilapidations Protocol for commercial property in England and Wales, the landlord should generally send it within 56 days after the lease ends, and the tenant should usually respond within 56 days of receiving it. The protocol doesn't define dilapidations: what you owe depends on the terms of your lease. The law also caps damages for failing to repair. Under section 18(1) of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1927, they can't exceed the amount by which the landlord's interest has fallen in value because of the disrepair.

Service charges

In a multi-let building, you'll pay a share of the landlord's costs of running the common parts: cleaning, security, maintenance of shared plant, insurance and management. It can be a large cost on top of the rent.

RICS publishes a professional standard on this, Service charges in commercial property (2nd edition), in effect since 31 December 2025. RICS says it aims to help ensure that budgets and year-end certificates are issued on time, and that it gives guidance to owners and occupiers on negotiating leases. It's a useful reference for what good practice looks like. Before you sign, ask:

• what the current budget is, and what your share would be;
• for the last year-end service charge certificate or accounts;
• whether any major works are planned that the service charge would pay for;
• how your share is worked out, and what the service charge covers and excludes.

Your fit-out: alterations, licence and reinstatement

Almost every first office needs some fit-out, even on a Cat A floor: meeting rooms, a kitchen, data, furniture. Check three things in the heads of terms and the lease:

• Consent. Leases usually restrict alterations without the landlord's consent. Your fit-out will usually be approved in a separate document, a licence for alterations. Allow time for it in your programme.
• Reinstatement. Will you have to remove your fit-out and put the floor back at the end? That cost belongs in your thinking now, not in five years.
• Timing. If you need weeks of fit-out before you can move in, raise it while terms are still open, for example through access before the lease starts or the rent-free period.

The cost of the fit-out itself (your Cat B) is often bigger than first-time occupiers expect. Get an indicative range before you agree terms, not after.

Other things to check before you sign

• Health and safety. GOV.UK says that as a tenant you'll normally be responsible for things like fire safety, the safety of electrical equipment and managing asbestos, and for providing enough space, ventilation and lighting, and toilets and washing facilities. Check what the lease leaves with you.
• Permitted use and sharing. Can you share space with a group company or sublet part of the floor if you shrink?
• Insurance. Who insures the building, and what you must insure yourself.
• Deposit or guarantee. For a young company, landlords often ask for a rent deposit or a guarantor. Agree the amount and when it comes back.
• Your solicitor's report. Read it, and ask about anything you don't understand before you sign.

For a nursery or other specialist use, the building checks go further. See will this building work for a nursery?

Frequently asked questions

Looking at a floor right now?

If you're about to agree heads of terms, a brief and a test-fit tell you whether the floor works and what to ask the landlord, while there's still time to ask. In a free intro call, we'll talk through the floor and your timing.

Book a free intro call See the Workspace Brief Sprint →