180+ CRE terms in the glossary, the working broker's reference.

We just shipped /glossary, a working reference of 180+ commercial-real-estate terms aimed at the people who have to use them every day. Tenant-rep and landlord-rep brokers, paralegals running lease prep, junior associates trying to get fluent fast.

Why we wrote it

CRE has more jargon than almost any business adjacent to it. Some of it is standardized across markets (SF, NNN, OPEX) and some of it is hyper-local ("warm vanilla" in retail-buildout copy means different things in Houston than in Chicago). The existing glossaries online are either thin (Wikipedia-grade definitions, no working examples) or paywalled (the Urban Land Institute reference is great and costs money).

We wanted a free reference that was pragmatic, what does a working broker actually need to know about "option to renew at fair market rent", rather than encyclopedic. The 180+ terms in the glossary are the ones that show up most often in our own product, the ones our customers' brokers ask Claude about, and the ones that come up in deal docs we've abstracted.

What's in it

Three buckets. Lease terms (TI allowance, percentage rent, exclusive use clauses, cotenancy, holdover rate, etc.), the longest section, and the one most directly useful in a deal. Financing and capital-stack terms (cap rate, NOI, IRR, preferred equity, the various flavors of mezzanine debt). Market-mechanic terms (Class A/B/C, asking vs. effective rent, sublease overhang, the differences between gross and net market reports).

Each entry has a one-paragraph definition, then a working example pulled from a real deal scenario (anonymized), then "watch out for" notes, the gotchas that experienced brokers know but that new brokers learn the hard way. The watch-out section is the one we hear the most positive feedback on.

Who it's for

Three audiences. First, working brokers using the glossary as a quick reference, "what's the standard formula for percentage rent breakpoint, again?" Second, junior associates and analysts trying to get fluent. We've heard from a couple of brokerage training directors who've started using the glossary as part of new-hire onboarding. Third, and this surprised us, clients of brokerages who are trying to understand their own LOIs and lease drafts. Tenants who are signing their first big office lease, in particular.

What we'd improve next

Two things. First, more market-specific entries, the language varies meaningfully between coastal markets and the Sun Belt, and between office, retail, and industrial. We'll be expanding the regional and sector-specific terms over the summer. Second, deeper linking to relevant DealDesk features. When you read the entry for "lease abstraction," the natural next step is to abstract a lease, and right now the glossary doesn't quite carry you there. We'll fix that.

If you find a term we're missing or a definition that reads wrong, the glossary has a feedback link on each entry. We read every one of them. The reference is a living document.