Property condition report template

A move-out inspection is won or lost at move-in. Whatever the report says on the day the keys change hands is the baseline every later claim gets measured against, and a thin move-in report cannot be repaired eleven months later.

The template below is written for a residential tenancy, where the same document gets filled twice by two different people and the two versions sit side by side. It also works for a sale walkthrough or a lender's inspection, though a commercial property condition assessment of building systems and remaining useful life is a bigger job with its own scope.

Same rooms, same order, both times

Fix the room order at move-in and never change it. Entry, kitchen, living, hall, bath, bedroom 1, bedroom 2, exterior, then meters and keys. The move-out walk repeats that order exactly, so anyone comparing the two reads down two columns instead of hunting.

The last line matters more than it looks. A move-out report that does not name the baseline it was compared against invites the reply that no baseline existed.

Four columns per room, one photo number

Rows for elements in good condition are worth writing. "Bedroom 2 walls, good, no marks, photo 18" at move-in is the row that decides the argument about the hole behind the door at move-out.

Notes carry the size. "Scuff on the wall" describes a mark you could cover with a thumb and a mark two feet across equally well. "Two scuffs, each about 2 inches, left of the light switch at shoulder height" describes one of them.

The condition scale has to mean the same thing to both sides

Print the definitions on the form itself, above the first room. A scale everyone signed and nobody defined is what turns a deposit conversation into a dispute.

Keep verdicts out of the notes. Write "burn mark, about 1 inch, on the worktop right of the hob" and let the photo and the date do their work. "Tenant damage, deduct" is a conclusion, and conclusions in the observation column read as a decision made before the walk.

Photograph the things nobody photographs

Wide shot of each room from the doorway, then the specifics. The ones that get missed and then get argued about:

• Meter readings, with the serial number legible in the same frame
• Keys, fobs and remotes laid out and counted
• Appliance model and serial plates
• The wall behind every door, where handles land
• Under the sinks, including the cabinet floor
• Inside the oven and the fridge seals
• Floor at door thresholds, where wear starts
• Smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, with a note that each was tested
• The exterior, including any garden or balcony surface

Timestamps and location data on each frame are what make the set hard to challenge later. A photo with an argued date is worth much less than a photo with a stamped one.

A filled example, from a tenancy that never ran

Property: Unit 4B, Larkspur Court. Move-out inspection, September 3, 2026, 10:00 to 10:50. Inspected by K. Osei, property manager. Both leaseholders present. Compared against the move-in report of August 12, 2025.

The carpet row is the one worth studying. Naming the tenancy length in the note is what turns "worn carpet" into a defensible position on normal wear, and it takes a few extra words.

A condition report records condition, not cost

Cost estimates. Quotes and deductions belong in a separate document, produced after someone has priced the work, and mixing them makes the report look like a bill.

Blanket entries. "All rooms: good" saves you five minutes at move-in and costs you the entire deposit conversation later.

Anything you did not personally look at. If a room was locked or full of boxes, say so, with the reason and the time.

Sitewise handles the walk on iPhone and iPad: photo, a dictated note that transcribes on the phone, a sketch on the image to circle the mark, a typed observation, and each capture stamped with the time and, when location is on, a GPS pin. Basements and empty units with no signal are fine because capture works offline. The walk exports as a PDF or DOCX you can send while you are still in the car. Signatures happen outside it, on paper or in whatever platform holds your leases, because it does not do e-signature, and it does not price work or manage tenancies.

The rules for what to shoot, and when, carry over from construction: the photo documentation guide covers the ones worth borrowing.

Compare the two reports before you send anything to the tenant. The row that usually collapses a deduction is a move-in row that says "fair" where the manager later remembered "good", and finding it yourself is a much better afternoon than having it found for you.