Ask the Experts, Landscape Maintenance
What Should Be in a Commercial Landscape Maintenance Contract?
A commercial landscape maintenance contract should spell out exact scope, visit frequency, material quantities, pricing structure, response-time commitments, and cancellation terms, not leave any of it to assumption. Vague language in any one of those categories is usually where a cheaper bid ends up costing more later. This article covers what a contract should specify, what’s often missing from lower bids, how pricing is typically structured, and how to compare multiple bids fairly.
What Should a Commercial Landscape Contract Include?
A contract should name a specific number of visits, not a general cadence, along with exact material quantities for anything seasonal. Kim SolCruz, Business Developer at Southern Botanical, sees where that specificity tends to break down in cheaper proposals. “Proposals are missing transparency on precise information, like the number of color flats or how many yards of mulch are included in the price,” SolCruz explains. “The number of visits can also be slightly different than the scope, or I’ve even seen vendors throw out an estimate without ever going on site.”
Cancellation terms deserve the same scrutiny. “It should be a simple 30-day out for both parties,” SolCruz says, “but I’ve seen a few that are 90-day out with restrictions, cancellation only on the exact date of the contract’s end, or other vendor-friendly wording.” That kind of language is easy to miss until a property actually needs to exit.
What Do Cheaper Bids Usually Leave Out?
Subcontracting is one of the harder gaps to catch on paper. “Subcontracting won’t show in the proposal,” SolCruz warns. “The property manager would need to ask outright if they’re subcontracting.” According to SolCruz, the categories most often handed off to a third party are irrigation, tree care, and agronomy — worth asking about directly rather than assuming an in-house team covers all three.
How Should Pricing Be Structured?
Most commercial contracts are priced as a flat monthly rate rather than itemized bill by bill. What shouldn’t get folded into that flat rate, though, are the line items with the most variability. “I always recommend not putting in insect and disease control or irrigation repair,” SolCruz advises. “Those two items are such variables that they can cause bids to have a large variance for comparison, and if the property doesn’t use them, the client is overpaying year after year.”
What Response Time and Communication Should Be in Writing?
A maintenance contract should specify more than mowing days. “You should get weekly Account Manager communication,” SolCruz says, “and you want a company with a 24-hour care line and references who can confirm their response time.” That’s a commitment worth verifying with an actual reference call, not just taking on faith from the proposal.
How Should You Compare Multiple Bids Fairly?
The fairest comparison starts before the bids even come in. According to SolCruz, property managers should supply their own frequency and scope requirements upfront rather than leaving that spec up to the bidder’s discretion, since a consistent ask is what makes the responses genuinely comparable. From there, the order of comparison matters. “Compare the scope and frequency side by side, compare color and mulch amounts, and price last,” SolCruz says.
Another signal to note is the bid process itself. “The bidder that takes the bid seriously — by asking questions, performing site visits, and wanting site specifics — works for a company that takes their maintenance contract work just as seriously,” SolCruz adds.
A contract’s real value shows up in what it doesn’t leave to interpretation. Southern Botanical’s teams build proposals around a documented site visit and a specific scope, rather than a generic estimate, so the contract matches what the property needs. If a current contract feels light on specifics, a side-by-side scope review can confirm whether it holds up.
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s the biggest red flag in a cheap commercial landscaping bid? Vague material quantities, like mulch yardage or the number of seasonal color flats, and a visit count that doesn’t match the described scope are both common signs of a bid that’s underspecified rather than genuinely competitive.
Should a landscaping contract be priced monthly or itemized? Most commercial landscaping contracts are amortized over the year and billed as a flat monthly rate, though variable items like irrigation repair are often better handled separately.
Why shouldn’t irrigation repair be included in a flat monthly rate? Irrigation repair needs vary widely by property and season, so bundling it into a flat rate can either inflate the price for a property that rarely needs it or leave the contract underpriced for one that does.
How do I know if a landscaping company is subcontracting my property? Subcontracting isn’t always disclosed in a proposal, so it has to be asked about directly — irrigation, tree care, and agronomy are the services most commonly handled by a third party.
What cancellation terms should a commercial landscaping contract include? A standard, fair cancellation clause allows either party to exit with roughly 30 days’ notice, without restrictions tying the exit to a specific date or renewal window.
What should I compare first when reviewing multiple landscaping bids? Scope and visit frequency should be compared before price, since two bids with the same price can represent very different levels of service once the specifics are lined up.
