© 2024 ООО “Office Times”
Author: Elena Elagina
Rubrics: Pre-feasibility consulting
– How to minimize the cost of repairs, moving, arrangement?
– Not to move.
A person always strives for the best. The idea of moving is often born in response to problems in the current office. Is it possible to do without moving and in what cases it will be a justified decision?
The question of moving comes before the majority of tenants sooner or later
As I have said many times, moving is a multi – level project, with its own tasks, goals and required resources. Whether it is necessary, whether it will be justified, whether the company has sufficient resources for repair, arrangement in new office, the Deposit and an advance payment? Are you ready to spend time and nerves searching for premises, negotiating, negotiating a contract, building and moving to a new office?
As my experience shows, some problems can be solved without falling into a new place. What conditions are necessary and sufficient to change your decision to move and stay in the current office?
The decision to move must be well calculated and weighed
Each party to the agreement seeks to protect its interests as much as possible. And if the landlord is going to improve the legal conditions of the current contract, it can be a good reason to stay. For example, the inclusion in the contract of improving the conditions at the end of the contract. As a tenant you have a choice, your legal protection increases. This is a good reason to think about moving, especially if there are no such conditions in the draft contract with the new landlord.
Note to landlord. If the tenant is not legally protected, he feels uncomfortable, so sooner or later he will look for the option of moving.
If the building has problems with air conditioning, electricity-it is bad for business. You must renounce such conditions. But the change in the technical conditions of the premises for the better is a very strong argument in favor of staying in the same place.
Improvement of technical conditions is a reason to delay the move
Ideal for the tenant, when the owner of the building undertakes to eliminate the shortcomings at his own expense. And if you are satisfied with the other parameters of the office, the move can be postpone with the improvement of technical conditions.
In most cases, operational and technical problems are global in nature and apply not to one office, but to the entire building. Problems with air, water, electricity, heating are caused by obsolescence of equipment and communications. And the main question here –whether it is possible to reach any consensus with the landlord, whether it is possible to make legal conditions of the contract. If mutual understanding is not achieved, you can safely see what offers are on the market, and prepare the ground for the move.
In my practice, there was only one case when we almost could not help the client. He ordered a technical expertise to the landlord to improve the adverse technical conditions. Unfortunately, the terms of the contract he had signed earlier left no room for manoeuvre. The landlord was, as they say,"in his right." The only thing that we managed to do – to solve the current problems to restore the minimum comfort in the office at the expense of the landlord. This case refers to the previous point: legal protection is the basis of the tenant's comfort, although it concerns the technical conditions.
We have in practice the reverse examples, when landlords go to make the necessary technical improvements in order not to lose the tenant.
Note to landlord. If the technical conditions deteriorate and you are not trying to find a compromise, the tenant will strive to find a more comfortable option as soon as possible.
The issue of financial conditions always requires in-depth study, and it is not without reason that we make an economic examination of the proposal before agreeing to it. If you want to save on rent, then study offers in the market in depth. It is necessary to distinguish between the concept of "rental rate" and "rental costs".
Carefully study all financial components of any offer
If you find a new office that will cost you 1000 rubles per square meter cheaper than the current one, be sure to study the other financial components of the future contract. In particular, the size of the Deposit, utility bills, operating costs, Parking fees, pay attention to the order of calculations, the readiness of the room. Repairs and relocation are also investments that need to be taken into account in budgeting. And only after you make at least a rough economic examination of the project, you will be able to understand whether the new office will cost you less?
We do not advise our customers to take even in financially profitable projects, if they have problems with life support systems. Poor ventilation or water problems will nullify all potential financial gains.
Going to improve the functionality? Look for hidden reserves in the current office
And what if the company develops, grows and has little space in the former office? If everything else suits you, talk to the landlord about the new areas. We'll have to be ready for different proposals. Do not rush to discard them, even if they do not quite coincide with the "ideal way" that you imagined. Perhaps the proposed option is quite good, if you look at it from different points of view.
Here is an example from the last project. The customer needed additional space. The owner offered a block in front of the main office. The customer initially refused because he presented the solution in a different way. But we saw the obvious advantages of the room. It was enough space and the input block, and on the client site, and at the negotiating. With our help, the customer appreciated these advantages . In the end, the question of moving was shot, this saved the customer significant resources.
Note to landlord. If the company has grown, it can hold only one thing-additional space convenient for the company's functionality.
So, if we see that improvements can be made in legal, technical and financial matters, the issue of relocation can be postponed. By the way, we conduct such an analysys, to understand how justified the idea of moving and whether it is possible to solve the problem by improving the conditions in the current room.
In many cases, a properly made request solves everything, so we always support an open and constructive dialogue between all interested parties. Solving current problems and improving conditions are a good reason to refuse to move.