diff --git a/GNUmakefile b/GNUmakefile
index a73fe9a6d8cf..b2a53518e0fb 100644
--- a/GNUmakefile
+++ b/GNUmakefile
@@ -2,6 +2,9 @@ TEST?=$$(go list ./... |grep -v 'vendor')
 WEBSITE_REPO=github.com/hashicorp/terraform-website
 PKG_NAME=azurerm
 
+#make sure we catch schema errors during testing
+TF_SCHEMA_PANIC_ON_ERROR=1
+
 default: build
 
 build: fmtcheck