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COI tracking for property management

A portfolio collects certificates from vendors who work on the property and, when the lease says so, from tenants. One building’s exhibit is not automatically every building’s exhibit.

Updated November 7, 2026 · Published by COI Tracker, an editorial resource

Vendors and tenants

Property managers usually meet certificates in two relationships.

Vendors are the companies that work on the building: janitorial, landscaping, elevator, roofing, security, and the contractor you hired for a repair. You ask them for a certificate because the service agreement says so, and because they are on the property. The request and arrival check for that relationship are on the vendor COI guide. Wording you can adapt is the vendor section of the request letter.

Tenants are asked when the lease requires the tenant to carry insurance and to show it. The certificate holder, the additional-insured parties, and the limits are whatever that lease names. A tenant certificate is not a vendor certificate with the names swapped. Keep a separate requirement set for tenant leases and another for vendor agreements. Do not mark a tenant compliant because the janitorial vendor at the same address was accepted.

What “compliant” can mean, and what it cannot mean, is on COI compliance. A certificate is still not the policy.

What the file usually has to show

Leases and vendor agreements often mention some of the following. Yours may mention fewer, or more. This list is not a model lease.

  • The named insured matches the tenant on the lease, or the vendor on the service contract.
  • The certificate holder is the owner, the manager, or both, spelled the way the agreement spells them.
  • The lines the agreement names. General liability is common. Automobile matters when the party drives on the property and the agreement requires it. Workers’ compensation matters when the agreement requires it for a vendor’s employees. An umbrella or excess line appears when the agreement asks for one. A tenant lease sometimes also asks for property insurance on the tenant’s own improvements or contents. If your lease does not ask for that, do not add it because another lease did.
  • Limits compared with the agreement. This page does not publish dollar limits.
  • Additional insured status or a waiver of subrogation only if the agreement requires them, and the endorsement itself if your standard says the certificate remark is not enough.
  • An expiration date for each required line, so a portfolio can see which building has something ending this month.

Use the verification checklist when the file arrives. Use how to read a certificate if the boxes are unfamiliar.

A portfolio workflow

  1. Write the requirement set from the agreement you actually use: one for vendor types, one for the lease form, and another if an owner’s exhibit differs.
  2. Ask before the vendor starts, or before the tenant takes possession, if that is what the agreement says. Give one monitored address.
  3. File the certificate against the party and the property. A company that services ten buildings may need ten comparisons if the exhibits differ.
  4. A named person accepts or rejects. A property manager who is not allowed to waive a short limit should not be the person who types Accepted.
  5. Watch the earliest required end date. The renewal process is the cadence. Many teams ask about 30 days ahead. That is a habit, not a notice period in a lease.
  6. Tell the person who can hold a vendor off the property, or who handles a tenant default, when a required line is unresolved. Do not invent a consequence your lease does not give you.
  7. When a vendor contract or a lease ends, mark that row inactive so you stop requesting certificates you no longer need. Keep the certificate you relied on. How many years is your records schedule. This page will not give you a number.

Several properties, one vendor

National and regional vendors reuse one insurance program across a portfolio. Your owners may not. A high-rise and a garden property, or two owners in one management company, often name different holders and different limits. Accepting “we have their COI at the other building” copies the weaker file onto the stricter job.

If your written standard allows one certificate to evidence several locations, check that the description actually covers those locations. Silence in the description is not a list of your buildings. The same point is in the vendor guide’s multi-site section.

Spreadsheet or software

A sheet works while one person can see every open row and the requirement sets are few. The spreadsheet template is the column list, including a date per line so a blank automobile expiration cannot hide inside a single date. The starter kit emails you that sheet.

A portfolio gets harder when several managers edit the log, buildings renew in different months, or the same vendor must be compared with more than one owner’s exhibit. That is a reason to look at software. It is not a unit-count at which a spreadsheet becomes wrong. The category page describes the jobs. The shortlist is how to compare. NetVendor’s fact sheet records that its public homepage speaks to property managers. That is a description of their page, not a recommendation, and it does not establish a connection to any property-management system. Other fact sheets are on the index. Where a public page did not name a system, the sheet says unknown. A connection to property software stays unknown unless the vendor’s public page names the system.

Prices, other than a figure a fact sheet cites from a vendor’s own page, are unknown here. Use the pricing questions if you request a quote.

Corrections: info@coitracker.com.