1.6 WELL Portfolio & WELL at Scale: Scope, Documentation Scales & Score

1.6 WELL Portfolio & WELL at Scale: Scope, Documentation Scales & Score

Quick Answer: WELL Portfolio applies WELL across many properties at once instead of one asset at a time. A defined portfolio needs at least 10 projects (or 2, if the member owns fewer than 10 in total), scoped by a category such as geography, typology or ownership and approved by the IWBI coaching contact. Documentation may be submitted at three scales — Individual, Shareable and Audited. Achievement rolls up into the WELL Portfolio Score: an integer from 0 to 100 equal to the occupant-weighted average of points achieved across all projects, with any project missing a precondition capped at 49 points.

The WELL AP exam specification names this program explicitly. Domain 11 is titled WELL Certification and WELL Portfolio, and its Portfolio Program sub-block asks for knowledge of "WELL Portfolio scope and eligibility requirements," "WELL Portfolio scales of documentation and review process within WELL Portfolio," and "factors that influence the WELL Portfolio Score." Those three items are exactly what this section covers.

[!NOTE] Naming. IWBI has since rebranded the portfolio-level offering as WELL at scale, and current IWBI materials use that name (a WELL at scale subscription earns unlimited certifications and ratings across subscribed locations, with an organization-level WELL Score). The exam's reference list still names the WELL Portfolio Guidebook, so learn the mechanics under both labels and treat "WELL Portfolio Score" and "WELL Score" as the same concept at different program generations.

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1. Subscription & Enrollment

• The portfolio-level program is a subscription, not a single-cycle registration. For the first term, the minimum commitment is a five-year subscription.
• Enrollment includes WELL coaching support to help define the portfolio scope and identify efficiencies for pursuing features across locations.
• Deliverables include an overall WELL Portfolio Score for the defined portfolio, alongside any individual project certifications, precertifications and ratings earned by locations inside it.
• Precertification Review fees are waived for projects enrolled in WELL Portfolio — a meaningful commercial difference from single-asset projects.

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2. Defining the Portfolio Scope

+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|                    WHAT MAY DEFINE A PORTFOLIO                            |
|                                                                           |
|   • Geography            (e.g., all European assets)                      |
|   • Typology / use type  (e.g., all distribution centers)                 |
|   • Ownership / fund     (e.g., all assets in a named investment fund)     |
|                                                                           |
|   RULE: the administrator must enter ALL projects meeting the definition   |
|   and may NOT unreasonably exclude properties to gain an unfair advantage. |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Size and membership rules

• Minimum size: a defined portfolio must contain at least 10 projects — unless the member's total global portfolio contains fewer than 10, in which case the minimum project count is two.
• Approval: the defined portfolio must be approved by the member's WELL coaching contact at IWBI, and the member must accurately communicate the scope in all public-facing materials, distinguishing it from other properties under the same owner.
• New construction: properties that qualify may be added at any point during design or construction, but inclusion is only required at substantial completion of construction. A project that has not reached substantial completion may not submit or be assigned feature documentation unless it is pursuing Precertification in that review cycle.
• Low occupancy carve-out: completed projects with occupancy rates below 25% may be excluded from the portfolio definition.
• Acquisitions: qualifying properties acquired must be added within one year of acquisition. Divested properties must be removed by the next review cycle. Subscription fees are assessed annually on current portfolio size.

Groupings and sub-portfolios

• Administrators may create groupings on any characteristic to track progress and assign documents. Groupings are internal — never publicly displayed, never given an official IWBI designation.
• A sub-portfolio is different: a subset of at least five projects that itself satisfies a portfolio definition category is eligible for its own WELL Portfolio Score and placement on the associated leaderboard. A global 20-project portfolio containing 10 European assets can have the European sub-portfolio scored and ranked separately while the whole portfolio also appears on the overall leaderboard.

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3. Roles and Responsibilities

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4. The Three Scales of Documentation

This is the heart of what makes portfolio-scale WELL efficient, and it is the most examinable part of the program.

Rules that follow from the scales

• Assigning a Shareable document is an attestation that it applies as written to each selected location.
• Once a WELL Reviewer approves a Shareable document, it is approved for all locations to which it was assigned at the beginning of that review cycle. Locations that get the document assigned later receive credit at the portfolio's next review cycle.
• Any change to a Shareable document during a review cycle requires reconfirmation by the locations relying on it.
• Multiple documents may live in the library for the same feature, so different subsets of locations can satisfy one feature different ways.
• Audited photographs must be date stamped and identify the location.

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5. Review Cycles and Reverification

• Portfolio subscription fees include up to two review cycles per year, scheduled by the portfolio administrator. Additional cycles may be scheduled for additional fees.
• Projects in a portfolio are not required to pursue all features at once. A location may pursue documentation-based features in one cycle and performance-based features in a later cycle.
• Each review cycle can include Intent-stage documents for Precertification, Implementation-stage documents that contribute to the Portfolio Score, and performance testing results.
• Performance testing must recur at least every three years, and results must be resubmitted for any features previously awarded on that basis.
• The WELL Digital Platform flags expired documents and test results. When something expires, the associated features stop being considered met — and because each project's points feed the score, expiry directly moves the WELL Portfolio Score. Teams renew or replace expired items in a future review cycle to regain the features.

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6. Calculating the WELL Portfolio Score

   WELL Portfolio Score = weighted average of points achieved across all
                          projects, weighted by each project's actual or
                          expected OCCUPANT COUNT, rounded to the nearest
                          integer.  Range: 0 - 100.

   Precondition gate:  a project that has NOT met all preconditions
                       contributes a maximum of 49 points, even if its
                       optimizations total more.

The factors that move the score — the exam's actual question

1. Points achieved per project. Every feature validated by a project adds to that project's point total.
2. Occupant weighting. Scores are weighted by the actual or expected number of occupants at each project, so a 2,000-person headquarters moves the score far more than a 20-person satellite office. Where occupancy is unknown, teams may use default occupancy assumptions such as those published by LEED or BREEAM, or other sources approved by IWBI.
3. The 49-point precondition cap. Preconditions award no points, but failing to meet them all caps a location's contribution at 49 — the single most important structural incentive in the program.
4. Portfolio composition. Adding acquisitions, removing divested assets and reaching substantial completion all change the denominator.
5. Document and test expiry. Features drop out when documentation or performance testing lapses.
6. Minimum basis: the WELL Portfolio Score must be based on at least two projects.
7. Update timing: the score is updated following acceptance of a WELL report from a review cycle — not continuously.

[!IMPORTANT] A WELL Portfolio Score above 50 does not mean the portfolio is certified. The score is a portfolio-level metric; WELL Certification is still awarded to individual locations. Projects inside the portfolio that are not certified contribute zero points toward the score.

[!TIP] Worked example. A portfolio holds two locations. Location A houses 900 occupants and earned 60 optimization points with all preconditions met. Location B houses 100 occupants, earned 58 optimization points, but missed one precondition. Location A contributes 60; Location B is capped at 49. The occupant-weighted average is (60 × 900 + 49 × 100) ÷ 1,000 = 58.9, which rounds to a WELL Portfolio Score of 59. Note how little the small site's precondition failure cost the portfolio — and how much it would have cost if the headcounts were reversed.