Common Area Maintenance Calculator

CAM (Common Area Maintenance) covers shared building costs — landscaping, parking lot maintenance, security, common-area utilities, snow removal, and the admin overhead managing it all. Tenants pay their pro-rata share plus an admin fee, often subject to an annual cap that limits how fast the per-SF charge can rise. This calculator computes the full annual and monthly CAM billing including the cap test.

Annual CAM expenses

Cleaning, landscape, security, utilities common areas

Total rentable SF

Tenant SF

Admin fee %

CAM cap % YoY

Tenant cap on annual CAM growth

Prior year CAM (per SF)

Annual CAM billing to tenant

$12,936

Monthly CAM billing

$1,078

CAM / SF (uncapped)

$2.40

CAM / SF (capped)

$2.31

Pro-rata share %

6.67%

Admin fee

$1,386

How the math works

CAM (Common Area Maintenance) covers shared building costs — landscaping, parking lot, security, common-area utilities, and management. It's billed pro-rata based on tenant SF / total SF, plus an admin fee of 10-15%.

Tenants negotiate annual CAM caps (typically 5-7% YoY) to limit landlord cost pass-through. 'Controllable' caps exclude utilities and taxes from the cap.

How to Use

Enter total annual CAM expenses, total rentable SF, and tenant SF.
Enter admin fee % (typically 12-15%).
Enter the annual CAM cap % and the prior-year CAM/SF baseline.
Read the annual and monthly CAM billing (capped) to the tenant.

Frequently Asked Questions

What's a controllable CAM cap?

A cap that excludes utilities, taxes, insurance, and snow removal from the YoY growth limit. Tenant-friendly leases use it to limit landlord-controlled cost growth (admin, landscape, security).