PRODA ingests and standardizes hundreds of slight variations of thousands of variables. The rent roll grids in the PRODA application have long supported hundreds of slight variations of the standardized variables, via column configuration. The power of column configuration is now coming to the third party API’s query endpoint.

Some examples of how this can be used:

• “Lettable Area (sqm)” can be configured to “Lettable Area (tsubo)” or “Lettable Area (sqft)” if these units of measure suit you better.
• The API can return “Contracted Rent PA / sqft” instead you having to fetch “Contracted Rent PA” and “Lettable Area (sqm)” and converting and normalizing yourself.
• “Tenant Name” can be configured as “Tenant Name (incl. pre-let)”, which automatically returns the value for “Next Tenant Name” for vacant units.

For details on how to use this, please see the query endpoint documentation.

Column configuration is considered ALPHA. Feel free to experiment. If you do, please let us know anything we could improve. It is not suitable for production use yet and may change and break without notice.

The following columns have been removed. Most of them have been deprecated for years. All of them have been deprecated since at least 2024.

_indexation_index_level_at_last_rent_adjustment, _rent_free_end_date, _currency_deposit, _is_vat_applicable, _rent_review_type, _notice_date_for_break_option, _walt_expiry, _security_deposit_amount, _break_option_notice_period_information, _ground_rent_expense_pa, service_charge_cap_description, area_sqm_or_spaces, _has_break_option_been_exercised, _indexation_month, service_charge_expense_pa, _walt_first_break_expiry, indexation_fixed_percent, _building_name, _floor, currency_service_charge, _locality, _region_level2, _region_level1, gla_sqm, _lease_break_date, _lease_break_option_information, service_charge_income_pa, service_charge_information, _tenant_business_sector, _renewal_probability_percent, _building_id, _security_deposit_expiry_date, _automatic_lease_prolongation, _extension_option_holder, _rent_free_start_date, _security_type, _security_required_amount, _rent_reduction_amount_pa, _has_competition_protection, _rent_amount_after_review, _rent_free_amount_pa, _lump_sum_operating_expense_income_pa, prepayment_operating_cost_income_pa, prepayment_heating_income_pa, _lease_expiry_notice_date, _lump_sum_cooling_income_pa, _lump_sum_electricity_income_pa, _lump_sum_heating_income_pa, _lump_sum_marketing_charge_income_pa, _lump_sum_other_recoverable_expense_income_pa, _lump_sum_waste_income_pa, _lump_sum_water_income_pa, prepayment_cooling_income_pa, prepayment_electricity_income_pa, prepayment_marketing_income_pa, prepayment_other_recoverable_income_pa, prepayment_waste_income_pa, prepayment_water_income_pa, _rentroll_date, _property_id_user, _rentroll_id, lump_sum_operating_expense_income_pa, lump_sum_electricity_income_pa, lump_sum_heating_income_pa, lump_sum_marketing_charge_income_pa, lump_sum_other_recoverable_expense_income_pa, lump_sum_waste_income_pa, lump_sum_water_income_pa, _property_asset_class_source, property_acquisition_type, acquisition_date, sale_date, number_of_rooms, number_of_bedrooms, lettable_area_general, erv_pm_sqm, vacancy_one_zero, has_competition_protection_one_zero, tenant_duns_number, _first_break_expiry_date, _tenant_has_exceptional_right_of_termination, _exceptional_right_of_termination_information, notice_period_for_lease_extension_option_months, lease_extension_length_months, extension_option_2_notice_period_months, extension_option_2_length_months, extension_option_3_notice_period_months, extension_option_3_length_months, extension_option_4_notice_period_months, extension_option_4_length_months, extension_option_five_notice_period_months, extension_option_five_length_months, contracted_rent_pm, _rent_review_start_date, rent_free_amount_pm, index_name_alternative, indexation_indexation_amount_pa, step_rent_1_new_rent_pm, step_rent_10_new_rent_pm, step_rent_2_new_rent_pm, step_rent_3_new_rent_pm, step_rent_4_new_rent_pm, step_rent_5_new_rent_pm, step_rent_6_new_rent_pm, step_rent_7_new_rent_pm, step_rent_8_new_rent_pm, step_rent_9_new_rent_pm, turnover_rent_pm, additional_rent_pm, rent_reduction_amount_pm, has_rental_guarantee_zero_one, rental_guarantee_service_charge_component_ampunt_pa, estimated_turnover_pa, lump_sum_operating_cost_valid_from, lumpsum_operating_expense_valid_to, prepayment_operating_cost_valid_from, prepayment_operating_expense_currency, service_charge_cap_pa, prepayment_operating_heating_income_pa, lump_sum_operating_heating_income_pa, prepayment_operating_heating_income_pm, lump_sum_operating_heating_income_pm, lump_sum_operating_heating_income_valid_from, lump_sum_operating_heating_income_currency, prepayment_opearting_heating_income_valid_from, prepayment_heating_income_valid_from, prepayment_operating_heating_income_currency, marketing_charge_pm, prepayment_operating_expense_valid_to, vat_pm, is_vat_applicable_one_zero, is_vat_applicable_rental_unit_one_zero, assupmtion_rent_pa_new_lease, service_charge_income_pm, heating_income_pm, lump_sum_operating_cost_income, lump_sum_heating_income, step_rent_1_new_rent_pp, step_rent_2_new_rent_pp, step_rent_3_new_rent_pp, step_rent_4_new_rent_pp, step_rent_5_new_rent_pp, step_rent_6_new_rent_pp, step_rent_7_new_rent_pp, step_rent_8_new_rent_pp, step_rent_9_new_rent_pp, step_rent_10_new_rent_pp, contracted_rent_pp, vat_pp, marketing_charge_pp, prepayment_operating_heating_income_pp, lump_sum_operating_heating_income_pp, additional_rent_pp, rent_reduction_amount_pp, turnover_rent_pp, erv_pm_sqm_unit, rent_roll_last_approved, void_months, initial_lease_length_months, rent_free_months, no_of_dock_doors, no_of_level_doors, initial_lease_length_years, rent_free_amount_pp, heating_income_fixed_pm, operating_expense_and_heating_income_fixed_pm, operating_expense_and_heating_income_fixed_pp, operating_expense_and_heating_income_pm, operating_expense_and_heating_income_pp, operating_expense_income_fixed_pm, housing_benefit_pm, housing_benefit_tenant_payable_pm, workbook_name, washer_dryer_income_pm, employee_unit_reimbursement_pm, percent_area, percent_rent, parent_comapny_id, notice_period_for_break_option_months, notice_period_for_break_option_two_months, break_option_3_notice_period_months, last_approved_by, net_maximum_legal_rent_pm, candidate_rentroll_id, dnb_maximun_credit_limit, dnb_maximun_credit_limit_currency, percentage_of_area, percentage_of_rent, percentage_of_total_units

As a side effect of significant performance improvements to the query endpoint, the JSON serialisation of results will change in two minor ways. These are not considered breaking changes. An API client should not have relied on the previous behaviour.

TIMESTAMP columns will have values looking something like "2017-11-15T10:10:00.58839+00:00" rather than "2017-11-15T10:10:00.58839Z". You should not rely on this. As stated in the documentation, we consider any ISO8601 timestamp format acceptable.

The order of fields in response row objects will likely be different. You should not rely on any particular order, not even within the same response.

Please review the proposed changes and indicate to us whether or not you anticipate problems.

Problems with ENUMs

The column-list endpoint declares some columns as having columnType ENUM. These are not really any different from STRING columns. They do have explicit lists of possible values, but these change over time, which makes them not very useful.

Inconsistent values between API and PRODA application. Some ENUM columns use machine representations of values, rather than human-readable values. For example, the column use_type_full returns values such as "OthDevelopmentLandAndSites" instead of "Development Land & Sites", like the PRODA application.

The solution

We want to remove ENUM columns from the API entirely. There are two possible approaches: we can either go through a lengthy deprecation process, or we can just change the existing columns in place.

This is where you come in. Our documented stability promises rule out the easy way of changing columns in place. We would prefer to do it anyway, with your consent. The shortcut of changing columns in place worked well for the FLOAT -> INT changes in January. If you anticipate problems, please let us know, and we will work something out. If you do not anticipate problems, please let us know.

Concrete proposal

We will change the values returned by the following columns to match the values the PRODA application displays:

• net_lease_type, next_net_lease_type
• rent_review_type
• security_type, security_type_two, security_type_three
• use_type_full

We will change all ENUM columns (listed below) to have columnType STRING instead:

• break_option_holder, extension_option_holder, extension_option_holder_two, extension_option_holder_three, extension_option_holder_four, extension_option_holder_five, break_option_two_holder, break_option_three_holder
• indexation_threshold_unit_percent_or_points
• net_lease_type, next_net_lease_type
• rent_review_type
• security_type, security_type_two, security_type_three
• tenure
• turnover_rent_payment_frequency, rent_payment_frequency, headlease_payment_frequency
• use_type_full_formatted (we will also mark this as deprecated, since it will be the same as use_type_full)
• use_type_full
• use_type

Feedback

Please let us know if you anticipate problems due to these changes.

New variables added:

• in_place_rent_pa
• loan_provider
• property_market

Existing variables modified:

• unit_street
• unit_street_number
• unit_postcode
• unit_city
• unit_region
• unit_country

We have added a new rentrolls field to the file details endpoint.

We have added a new originalFileId field to the list files endpoint.

We have changed the meaning of the originalFileName field in the list files endpoint. It now refers to the name of the file that was originally uploaded by the user, corresponding to the originalFileId field. We have added a new fileName field with the name of the current file.

We have made several updates to our data schema, including changes to column names for clarity and the addition of new variables.

• actual_lettable_area_sqm: The name has been changed from Actual Lettable Area to Lettable Area.
• contracted_lettable_area_sqm: The name has been changed from Lettable Area to Contract Lettable Area.
• privacy_level: New variable.
• payer_type: New variable.

We have added a new file details endpoint.

We have added a new list files endpoint.

We are planning on changing the column type of some variables from FLOAT to INT. We said we would not change column types, so this is technically a breaking change. However, these variables were already integers. The JSON serialisation will not change. We would like to make this change to improve consistency and performance. We would like to skip the usual deprecation process to avoid awkward variable names and creating more work for you with repeated renamings on our end.

If you think you would be negatively affected by this change, please reach out to us. We have notified customers by email as well.

These are the variables that we are proposing to change:

• parking_spaces
• excel_row_index
• unit_count
• rent_payment_day
• rentroll_id
• parking_and_
• lettable_area_unit_count
• bicycle_parking_spaces
• proda_portfolio_id
• extraction_id
• dnb_company_hierarchy_level
• dnb_employee_count
• dnb_company_risk_indicator
• rent_free_outstanding_months
• extension_options_count
• occupied_unit_count
• vacant_unit_count
• non_revenue_unit_count
• occupied_unit_count_excl_non_revenue_units
• vacant_unit_count_excl_non_revenue_units
• catella_parking_spaces

To maintain a more consistent naming convention across our API, we are updating the following variable names.

The new variables are the first to have columnType: INT. This column type has been documented for a long time, but these are the first variables to actually use it. If you're not handling this column type yet, you should start now.

Variable additions:

• proda_property_id
• proda_project_id

Variable deprecations:

• property_id - use proda_property_id instead
• project_id - use proda_project_id instead

Variable changes:

• operating_expense_and_heating_income_fixed_pm - Name change only. This variable was already deprecated and will be removed soon.
• operating_expense_and_heating_income_pm - Name change only. This variable was already deprecated and will be removed soon.

Initial public preview of a new Track Changes endpoint. This enables API access to algorithmic Track Changes variables like "Reason for Rent Change".

This is an alpha release. The endpoint is subject to change without notice.

If this seems useful to you or if you have suggestions to make it even more useful, please let us know.