When you work as a property manager of commercial or retail property, you will know the importance to the new property manager of an effective handover process.
If you are the new property manager yourself, you will know how difficult it is to get all the property detail off the previous landlord or manager.
Cooperation is generally lacking when it comes to the handover process.
Handover processes are critical to the ongoing management process.
To protect yourself and control the whole thing it is wise to use a checklist as a tool to capture all the issues.
When you are under pressure of the moment in bringing in a new property management, the people that you talk to will be numerous; in the larger properties the problem just gets bigger.
You must have a way of keeping notes and records through the whole event.
A general comment made by someone today may be a critical comment in 3 months time.
So just who do you talk to in the handover process? Here is a list to help you get started:

1. The landlord
2. The landlords solicitor who does the leases for the property
3. The landlords accountant who gets involved with the monthly income and expenditure
4. Existing tenants in the building
5. Maintenance contractors in the building
6. The previous property and or leasing manager
7. The local building authority regards any orders or notices that may impact the property directly or indirectly
8. The local council regards local property usage, approvals, and zoning
9. The neighbouring businesses and property owners
10. Get a title search so you know just who owns what and where the property boundaries are

All of these people can tell you so much about the location and the property you are about to manage.
This is where note taking is of high value; it protects you against dispute or disagreement later.
Given that each property is unique, you should eventually have a separate handover checklist for all property types such as retail, office, and industrial property.
You can make your own decisions about what goes into the checklist but here are a few things to get you started:

• The tenant detail
• Income status
• Arrears report
• Expenditure results year to date
• Expenditure budget for the year
• Tenancy schedule
• Options and rent reviews status
• Current rent invoices and charges
• Vacancy report
• Marketing report for any vacancies
• Lease status
• Contractors regards maintenance issues and plant and machinery performance
• Landlord communications and reports
• Tenant communication and current issues

The property management handover procedure in commercial and retail property is perhaps the most important part of setting up for the ongoing management; get it right and your job will be a lot easier.