How to Run the 11-Month Warranty Walk on Multifamily Jobs

How to Prepare for and Run the 11-Month Warranty Walk on Multifamily Projects

You finished the building. The punch list is closed, the owner signed off, and the units went to residents. Then a year goes by. Doors get opened and slammed thousands of times. Floors take furniture. Cabinets take a season of grease and humidity.

Now the owner's rep calls. They want to walk the building before the warranty runs out. Maintenance has a list of complaints, and they want you and your trades there. Nobody on your side remembers what unit 3-14 looked like on turnover day.

That is how a warranty walk goes sideways. The work is not hard. The records are what's missing. This guide covers what gets walked, who attends, how to sort items by trade, how to get into occupied units, and how to close every item for good.

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What the 11-Month Walk Is

Many multifamily projects carry a one-year warranty. The owner or property manager schedules a walk about a month before it ends. That is the "11-month" walk. The point is to find what has gone wrong while there is still time to fix it.

Your contract decides the details. Check it for the warranty length, when the clock started, who has to be notified, how fast you must respond to a claim, and what counts as a warranty item. This article is about running the walk well. It is not contract or legal advice, and your contract controls wherever the two disagree.

The walk is not a second punch walk. At turnover, the question was "is this unit finished?" At month 11 it is "did something we built fail, or did something change since we left?"

What Gets Walked

Ask the owner's rep for the scope in writing before you set a date. The contract may say every unit or a sample, and it may include common areas and exteriors. Do not assume.

Inside the units

For the trades that do interior finish work, these are the usual places problems show up:

• Flooring: seams opening up, planks or tile lifting, gaps at transitions, squeaks.
• Cabinets: doors and drawers out of adjustment, loose hinges, failing soft-close hardware, face frames pulling away from the wall.
• Countertops: seam movement, cracks at the sink or range cutout, caulk lines separating, loose backsplash.
• Paint and drywall: nail pops, hairline cracks at corners and openings, peeling at wet walls.
• Finish carpentry: trim gaps, loose door hardware, doors rubbing or latching badly, sagging closet shelves.
• Accessories: towel bars, shelf brackets, and mirrors coming off the wall.

Common areas

If your scope reaches corridors, stairwells, or lobbies, walk those too. Corridor flooring, stair trim, and lobby millwork take more abuse than anything in a unit.

Warranty items versus everything else

Not every item on the owner's list will be yours. Some will be wear from a year of living, damage from a move-in, or another trade's work. Whether an item is covered is a contract question, so do not decide it in the hallway. Log it, photograph it, and sort it afterward.

Who Attends

Too few people and the walk drags on for weeks. Too many and it turns into a crowd in a one-bedroom. Aim for the people who can make decisions and do the work.

Owner side:

• The owner's rep or asset manager, who decides what the owner will push on.
• The property manager, who controls access to the units and the residents.
• The maintenance supervisor, who knows which units have had repeat calls.

Contractor side:

• The GC's project manager or superintendent, who runs the walk and owns the master list.
• One person from each trade with scope in the building. Send someone who can say "we will fix that" and schedule it, not just someone who writes it down.

Roles to assign before you start:

1. Walk lead. Keeps the group moving and keeps arguments out of the unit.
2. Recorder. Logs each item with unit, room, trade, a photo, and a short description.
3. Access coordinator. Works with the property manager on which unit is next, who has the key, and which residents were told.

If one person tries to do all three, the walk takes twice as long and items get lost.

Before the Walk: Get Your Records Together

The walk is only as good as what you bring. Show up with nothing, and you are working from memory against an owner with a year of complaints in a spreadsheet. Pull this together a week or two ahead:

• The final turnover records for every unit in scope
• The closed-out punch lists, including photos
• Install records by trade: who set the floor, who hung the cabinets, who finished the paint
• Any callback or service requests since turnover
• The owner's list, if they have already sent one
• Your contract's warranty section, printed or on your phone

How unit-by-unit records make the walk faster

If every item has to be argued from scratch, a big building takes days. If each door has a record of what it looked like at turnover, you open the unit's file before you walk in. You know what was punched, what passed, and what the owner signed for.

That changes the walk in three ways:

1. You walk with a target. If the record shows the kitchen passed clean and the owner's list says a cabinet door is misaligned, you know where to look first.
2. You skip what's settled. Items that failed at turnover, were fixed, and were signed off do not need a debate.
3. You can sort the list before you arrive. Many items on an owner's list will match a turnover photo or a pass verdict. Mark them ahead of time.

Settling "was it like that at turnover?"

This is the question that eats the most time on a warranty walk. A scratch on a countertop, a gap in a plank, a chip on a cabinet face. Was it there when the unit was handed over, or did it happen since?

Without records, the answer is whoever remembers loudest. With records, you open the unit and look.

If your turnovers ran through ProPunch, every door already has a Verified Turnover Record. It holds the walkthrough video with the checklist overlaid, the pass or fail verdict on each item, photos, and the client's sign-off. Pull up the kitchen, scrub to the countertop, and you both see its condition on the day of turnover. Nobody has to win an argument.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska www.kaboompics.com on Pexels

The same idea works with any records, as long as they are per unit, dated, and have photos. A folder of unlabeled photos settles nothing. Neither does a spreadsheet that says "kitchen OK" with no picture. If your turnover records are thin, walk anyway, document the condition today, and capture better records on the next job.

Organize Items by Trade

By the end of the first day, you may have hundreds of items. A flat list is useless. Sort it before anyone leaves the site.

Sort in three passes

1. By trade. Each trade should see only its own items.
2. By building and floor. Within each trade, group by building, then floor, then unit. That is how a crew works, one corridor at a time.
3. By type of item. Separate quick fixes (a hinge adjustment, a caulk bead) from real repairs (replace a plank run, re-set a countertop section).

Give every item a status

Use the same short set of labels for everything:

• Open: logged, nobody has taken it yet.
• Accepted: the trade agrees it is theirs to fix.
• Questioned: the trade says it is not warranty, or belongs to someone else. Needs a decision.
• Scheduled: a date and a crew are set.
• Fixed: work is done, photographed, and waiting on the owner.
• Closed: owner signed off.

The "Questioned" group is the one to watch. Check each item against your turnover records first, then against your contract. Where the contract is unclear, send it to whoever on your side handles those calls. Do not let questioned items sit.

Give every item one owner

An item with two trades on it gets fixed by neither. If a countertop seam opened because the cabinet base moved, someone has to decide who leads. Write that on the item.

Count the items per trade at the end of each day. It tells you where to look on the next job.

Schedule Access to Occupied Units

This is the part that makes or breaks the schedule. These are people's homes. Plan around that.

Work through the property manager

The property manager knows the lease terms, the notice rules, and which residents are likely to be home. Let them send the notices. Do not set dates directly with residents. Check your contract and the property's rules for how much notice is needed and what hours are allowed.

Build the schedule in blocks

• Group by floor or corridor. Walk one hallway at a time so nobody crosses the building twice.
• Give each unit a time window. A two-hour window is easier on a resident than "sometime Tuesday."
• Keep the party small inside units. A crowd in a bedroom makes residents uncomfortable.
• Start with vacant units. They are the easiest, and they let you set the pace before you deal with occupied ones.

Plan for the units you cannot get into

Some residents will not be home. Some will say no. Some will reschedule three times. Build in a second pass, and ask the property manager how to handle units that stay closed. Log every attempt with the date and reason. If the warranty window is close, that note matters. Your contract says what to do next.

Do the repairs in a second round

Walk first. Repair after. Once the lists are sorted by trade, each trade can book one repair visit per unit and hit every item at once. Fewer visits means fewer interruptions for residents, and fewer "nobody came" complaints.

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Run the Walk Day

Keep it simple, and keep it moving.

1. Kick off for ten minutes in the lobby or leasing office. Confirm scope, route, roles, and how disagreements will be logged.
2. Open the unit's turnover record before you go in. Glance at what passed and what was punched.
3. Walk the same route in every unit. Entry, kitchen, living room, bedrooms, bathrooms, closets. When the order never changes, nothing gets skipped.
4. Log each item right then. Unit, room, trade, a close photo, a wider photo showing where it is, and one sentence. If there is no signal in a stairwell or basement, use something that saves offline and syncs later.
5. Check the record on any "was it like that?" item. Look at the turnover photo or video together and write down what you both see.
6. Do not argue in the unit. If a trade disagrees, mark the item "Questioned" and move on. Settle it in the trailer.
7. Recap each day. Count items by trade, list missed units, and confirm tomorrow's route.

A good walk is boring. People show up, look, log, and leave.

Document Fixes and Close Items Out

A fix is not done when the crew leaves. It is done when the owner says so, and you can prove it.

What to record for every fix

• The item and unit it came from
• Who did the work and on what date
• A photo of the finished repair, taken from the same angle as the original
• Any note about cause, if the crew found one (a subfloor issue, a loose blocking, a leak above)
• A sign-off from the property manager or owner's rep

Close the loop with the owner

Send the owner a regular status of what is open, fixed, and closed, not one big dump at the end. When owners can see items moving, they stop calling. A client portal where they see unit status and sign off themselves is one way. A weekly emailed summary by unit and trade works too.

Items that will not close

Some items stay open: the owner rejects a repair, a resident blocks access, or two parties disagree on cause. Keep a short written trail for each: what was found, what was offered, and the dates. Your contract says what happens next.

When the last item closes, save the whole file with the project closeout documents: the walk list, before and after photos, sign-offs, and dates. If a question comes up a year later, the answer is in one place.

FAQ

When should the 11-month warranty walk happen?

Usually about a month before the warranty period ends, which leaves time to fix what is found. The exact timing and notice rules come from your contract, so check it for the start date and required steps. Start planning a few weeks ahead.

Do we have to walk every unit?

That depends on your contract and what the owner asks for. Some projects walk every unit, others walk a sample plus common areas. Get the scope in writing before you schedule anything.

What if the owner's list includes things that look like normal wear?

Log them anyway, with photos, and mark them "Questioned." Then compare each one against the turnover record and read what your contract says about that kind of item. Do not make the call in the hallway, and do not ignore the item.

How do turnover records help on the warranty walk?

They show what each unit looked like the day it was handed over. When someone asks "was it like that at turnover?", you open the unit's record and look at the photo or video together. It cuts down the argument and shortens the walk.

Who should be in the room for each unit?

Keep it small: the walk lead, a recorder, the property manager's rep, and the trade person responsible for the work in that room. More people slow the walk down and make residents uncomfortable.

Wrapping Up

The 11-month warranty walk goes best when the work was documented a year earlier. Per-unit records, a master list sorted by trade, a realistic access schedule, and a clear sign-off at the end turn a tense walk into a routine one. If you want every door to have a record ready for month 11, ProPunch builds one at each turnover. You can see how it works on the walkthrough page or check the pricing page.