AI data center tenants now want more than $5 million a day for delays

The companies renting AI data centers have stopped asking nicely. Tenants are now demanding more than $5 million per day in penalties when landlords fail to deliver power or finished facilities on time. Earlier this year, that figure sat at about $1 million per day. In other words, the price of being late has grown roughly fivefold in a matter of months, and the people building these campuses are the ones holding the bill. The fine print got expensive The tenants driving this shift are mostly hyperscalers and AI labs, the deep-pocketed buyers of compute that every developer wants on a long-term lease. Their leverage is showing up in the contracts. The jump in daily penalties ran from approximately $1 million per day in early 2026 to more than $5 million per day by October of the same year. Penalties are only one tool in the kit. Tenants are also pushing for rent abatements, liquidated damages and, in some cases, termination rights that are tied directly to when power and the building are actually ready. The SB Energy and OpenAI arrangement for projects in Ohio shows how sharp these terms can get. Under the deal, OpenAI receives one free day of rent for every day of delay, and that ...