First Office

This is a pretty basic question so apologies in advance - i'm running my business from home just now but it's grown too big for the garage and I'm sick of sharing my workspace with the cat litter trays so I need to move into a shop/office. Although I've been involved in property sales for years, I've no idea what to look out for/avoid in taking on a lease... Any tips or suggestions would be great!

Thanks

You dont mention where you are ?

Govan workspace - Harmony row glasgow do superb offices/rooms on a monthly lease ..rent starting circa £500 month for 700 sq ft

Hi Alastair,

I wouldn't be committing to any leases at this point. I'm sure you could find services offices that would be much more flexible for you.

Like Paul says not knowing where you are based makes it difficult to make any real suggestions. I could probably give you a few options in the Edinburgh area but it all depends where you are based

Thanks - I'm in Edinburgh. The background to my situ is this. I have a mortgage broker company, currently myself and four consultants all home based. I'm thinking of opening an office with a view to taking on two more consultants who would be based permenantly in the office, with some work space for myself and any of the other guys that wanted to do admin away from home or meet clients. AT the same time, I would bring in someone to do telesales for me in the evenings to generate appointments for the whole team. And at the same time, having an office somewhere like Bruntsfield/Morningside Road or Newington where theres a lot of through traffic as well as residents would in theory generate additional walk-in business.

It would have to be small-ish as my budget is pretty shoe-string - but I'm thinking of it as being a hub for the consultants I've already got and an extra bonus factor for recruiting others, rather than being the sole means of generating business.

The other option is to have office space somewhere for the same purposes as above but I'd been looking primarily at the shop option as I figured having a street presence somewhere busy would be good advertising....

Hope that makes some sort of sence!!

Dwightvanman,

From what you've said about your business, it sounds like it would benefit a lot from a dedicated office - ideally, with a shopfront - rather than shared space or a rented room in a business cenre.

With a visible presence in an area like Bruntsfield / Morningside / Newington, there's no doubt that you'd get a lot of off-the-street trade. That alone might justify the higher costs involved. Also, it would look much more professional than shared space or working from home.

That said, you might find that the off-the-street trade might actually be a disadvantage. You might get a lot of time-wasters. It depends a lot on the layout and design of your premises, and how you present yourselves.

I'm not saying that a dedicated office is necessarily better than shared space in a business centre. The latter would be more flexibile and would have a lower initial cost. I'm just saying that a dedicated office would have some valuable advantages of its own.

Mike

Thanks Mike - thats what I thought - theres pros and cons to each so I was looking for the option with the least cons for the budget! My other real concern is how to evaluate the terms of a lease, never having been involved in this before. For example, I was once involved in a conversation where one party seemed to complain about having an insuring and repairing lease, so not sure if this was actually a bad thing or if there were other options....

I would think that any solicitor with experience of property would be able to advise on the terms of the lease, etc. If you already have a solicitor, you could ask them if they can handle it, or if they can recommend someone else who can.

Mike

EDINBURGH COMMERCIAL PROPERTY



74 St Stephens Street
Extensive ground floor premises with double windowed frontage. 2,000sq ft approx. Rental offers in excess of £14,000 p.a.


Ooft

if it were me and i had a limited budget I would approach a shop in those areas (even a coffee shop) and try to arrange a deal with them where you rent the window space to advertise your property rather than commiting to a lease, at the same time as this taking space in cheaper short term office space until you have a viable business. We have a client in bruntsfield (accountant) who may be able to offer both a window front and desk space, I could certainly ask for you.

Dwightvanman I agree with the good advices you are getting here and would add from my experience:

a) Be very careful about the conditions of leases, especially with regard to any ‘full maintenance and dilapidations' conditions, and on any onorouos conditions that mean you are stuck with finding an alternative tenant for the landlord should you have to give up leasing the premises yourself.

I very much agree with hind on not committing to any leases at this point. But whilst suggests that you could find services offices that would be much more flexible for you, my reasoning is that the recession is impacting so severely just now that landlords are increasingly hungry for tenants – and as time goes on may offer you far more flexibility re exiting options etc.

b) Laserlads’s good advices on Govan Workspace were about Glasgow, but you might find it worthwhile to investigate the Third Sector/Social Enterprise sector in Edinburgh. Out-of the-Blue, for example, have an extraordinary range of spaces at the complex down Leith way (but maybe not of the size/type you need?). It can be that such Third Sector/Social Enterprise organisations offer extremely competitive rates because they are keen to attract ‘conventional’ businesses as part of their portfolio.


c) And on Mike’s point about how off-the-street trade might actually be a disadvantage because you might get a lot of time-wasters this has become a significant problem for a couple of guys in my home locality who have set up a small PC and IT outlet. Their business is prospering, but they are finding that ‘browse-and-chat-but-not-buying’ visitors are becoming a bigger and bigger distraction.

Hi - thanks you for all the replies and apologies for not responding sooner. I have been taking on board everything thats been said and trying to explore different avenues. As it stands just now, I've come to the conclusion that although for my business an office is good, my budget is so restricted that even an office with a rent such as the St Stephen Street one would be over what I would be comfortable committing to (even tho I could cycle there in 20 mins )) so I've been working Vituo's suggestion of renting space and hopefully have a deal which will let me put a mortgage broker in a chain with a number of locations across the central belt' leaving me only with a recruitment headache.

Edwards summary confirmed some of my reservations about committing to a lease in a single location' although the level of desperation amongst some of the landlords I've spoken to suggests that there could be some good deals available with relatively little haggling involved, but maybe for a few months down the line.

Appreciate all the feedback - thanks )