Joe DownsCEO & Co-Founder, Belrose Storage Group. Founder, Storage Moguls.

How ‘require’ language creates liability

7 May 2026 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

0:36

When a lease requires a tenant to winterize a boat by a certain date, the landlord takes on liability for checking it happened. If the engine cracks from freezing because the tenant didn't winterize, that mandatory language makes the landlord responsible for the damage.

Chapters

Let me be precise about why the line between recommend and require actually matters. When you require a tenant to perform a specific maintenance on their vessel in writing, in your lease, or in a verbal directive, you're implicitly taking on responsibility for verifying that maintenance was performed and for the consequences if it wasn't. If your lease says to tenant must winterize their boat by November 1st and a tenant's engine cracks in December freeze, your requirement language becomes part of the conversation about who bears responsibility.