NNN Lease Terms — a Working Glossary

The vocabulary of net lease, defined the way deals actually use it — because every term here has moved real money at some closing.

Absolute net: tenant bears every cost, roof and structure included; the mailbox-money standard. Base term / primary term: the years before options begin — the only term financing believes in. CAM: common-area maintenance charges; on single-tenant deals, the catch-all for site upkeep pass-throughs, capped or uncapped. Dark provision: tenant may close the store but must keep paying — rent survives; your financing and resale suffer. Escalations / bumps: scheduled rent increases (10%-per-five-years is retail’s default cadence). Estoppel: the tenant’s written lease confirmation (full explainer). Firm term: years before any termination right — a Walgreens speciality; price to it, not the headline. Go dark / kick-out rights: tenant exits early on triggers (sales thresholds, co-tenancy failures) — rare in single-tenant, fatal to miss. Ground lease: you own land; tenant owns building (explainer). NN (double net): landlord retains shell obligations (explainer). NOI: rent minus landlord expenses — on absolute paper, effectively the rent. Options: tenant’s renewal rights at set terms; value them as tenant’s choices, never your certainty. Percentage rent: sales-based rent on top of base — mall vocabulary, occasionally QSR. Rent commencement: when money starts, versus lease commencement when obligations do — new-construction buyers, read twice. Reversion: improvements returning to the landowner at ground-lease end. Rofr / rofo: tenant’s first-refusal or first-offer rights on your sale — chills auctions, worth basis points. SNDA: the lender-tenant treaty (explainer). Vanilla box / as-is: delivery condition vocabulary — who pays for what the space lacks.

Terms you don’t see defined in a listing package are terms worth asking about — the absent ones are usually where the deal’s story lives.