In this article, you'll learn:

• How FASB's ASC-842 changes lease accounting for businesses.
• The shift from off-balance sheet leases to recording leases as assets and liabilities.
• Steps businesses must take to comply, including valuing lease assets.
• Why leasing remains a strong option despite these changes.

Topic 842, which is how the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), refers to the 2016 document that redefined the rules for lease accounting, was approximately 10 years in the making. As of this writing in the back half of the summer of 2019, these rules are still not fully implemented across American business. That is changing. To understand the changes, though, we have to look at the history of this standard and how it relates to commercial real estate (CRE) tenancy.