Certain hotel brands have built their reputation not on glamour but on consistency — solid, well-organised, reliably functional. Business travellers trust them and return to them. That trust extends, often explicitly, to the relationship between the brand and its landlords: a property operating under such a brand tends to be assessed as a ‘safe pair of hands’, with lease terms reflecting that presumption.

Perceptions can lag behind reality. I was asked to assess a property belonging to exactly such a brand — well after opening, well before lease expiry. The brand had passed through multiple ownership changes across several continents in the intervening period, each accompanied by a shift in strategic priorities.

The property looked, at first glance, as the brand would lead you to expect. On closer inspection it was dated, in places worn, and in some areas visibly neglected. The maintenance obligation in the lease? No minimum expenditure had been specified — a substantial transfer of trust to the operator. The wording required only that the fit-out be maintained at ‘an appropriate quality level’; replacement FF&E was to transfer to the landlord every three years via updated inventory schedules.

No such schedules existed. No evidence of any FF&E renewal could be found. The property had been run, effectively, until its initial capital was consumed. The brand’s original quality had masked the deterioration for years. By the time I arrived, the hotel had declined in occupancy, rate and revenue; the owner had become alert, and the operator was offering to return the asset ahead of schedule. Further dispute was foreseeable.

The safeguards are straightforward: a lease must specify the level of maintenance expenditure, where reserves are held, who controls deployment and how expenditure is reported. Beyond that, a periodic walkthrough — one working day every few years — produces the documented condition record without which enforcement is impossible. Neither the guest nor the landlord can rely on a brand’s promise in place of their own oversight.