You’ve now made it to Week 9 in the process of moving your office. Phew! It’s been a lot of hard work so far — and there’s more hard work ahead. But for now, we’ll concentrate on Week 9. This is the week you should submit your tenant improvement plans to your landlord.
By this point, you need to have a concrete idea of what needs to be done to your new space. You also must have an idea of what improvements should be addressed by your landlord, what you’re going to cover and what your contractor must do.
Plan, plan, plan
You also must think ahead and consider worst-case scenarios. The more you change a space, the more likely it is that things will go wrong. Perhaps the new sink will be plumbed in the wrong place. Maybe you’ll discover the ceilings are too low for the new ceiling fans you have your heart set on. Or maybe you’ll discover that thanks to a change in city code, when you repave the parking lot, you’ll only be allowed to have 12 parking spaces instead of 20.
You will never be able to plan for all the things that can go wrong. Inevitably something will happen that you didn’t anticipate. However, with a lot of planning, and a contractor you know and trust, you’ll be able to ward off a lot of problems, stay on schedule and ensure you have the funding resources necessary for a great business launch in your new space.
As a bonus, if you meticulously plan for your renovation and are clear with your landlord about what they are doing and what you are doing, you will minimize misunderstandings and ensure that everything is accounted for and completed as expected. A good working relationship with your landlord will make future repairs, maintenance, and upgrades much easier and pleasant for everyone.
We can help!
If you haven’t downloaded it yet, you can get our Lease Timeline Checklist to help you plan your new office. This is the type of framework we use for all of our clients at Lighthouse CRE and we will provide a customized version for you based on your specific needs in retail, office, or industrial. We help our clients find the best spaces to lease and also the best properties to purchase.