Maintenance includes all measures that are part of maintaining or restoring the usable condition of a property. These measures can be divided into four categories: Inspection, maintenance, repair and improvement.

Maintenance includes all operations that involve maintaining the functionality of equipment (e.g. a heating engineer replacing the rubber seal on the heater every year).

Repairs of all kinds are subsumed under the term repair.

In contrast, improvement means that after a repair the end result is better than the initial condition before the defect, e.g. a component is replaced by a newer and better performing part.

In maintenance management, time and cost pressures continue to increase, putting pressure on the industry.

A major trend is Building Information Modeling (BIM), in which all relevant building data is captured, combined and digitally modeled. This data is constantly synchronized and is immediately and continuously available.