Whether you’re a new business starting out or a business which is making the jump from small startup to full-time business, then battling the issue of office space is likely to be one of the biggest concerns you’ll face in the first few months. Choosing the right space for your business is vital and will make sure that your business will get off to a flying start. Otherwise, you may find yourself with no office space of your own, or too large of a space for you to be able to handle.
Keeping this in mind, here are three of the most popular types of office spaces: home office, coworking space and rented offices, along with their pros and cons.
Home Office
When your business is just starting out, keeping costs low is important to the longevity of your business. Whilst an expensive office may look nice, it may cause financial difficulties if you don’t prepare for it. It’s very exciting setting up your own business, but in order to ensure it’s future, you need to be sensible for the first few years.
A home office, and working from home, comes with many benefits. For one, you eliminate the need for long, tiring commutes and it means your costs will be fairly limited. Flexibility is also a huge perk which comes with working from a home office, as it provides you with the ability to work as and when you need, but you can also work in those additional life-admin jobs much more easily. Things such as the school run, appointments and postal deliveries no longer need to cause you stress.
Coworking Spaces
Coworking is a fairly new concept and has only really become popular in the past 5 years or so. Coworking spaces mean that established businesses and freelance workers can work side by side. With these spaces, you can rent both a full office or even just a desk in a communal working area. For your business, this choice will depend entirely on how many people you have working for your business. If it is just you, then a desk will more than suffice, whereas you may wish to consider a larger rented office if you have more employees.
Rented Offices
Another choice when it comes to office space is rented offices. This is the classic and traditional choice for businesses, as often they come fully contained. If you choose a rented office, then in order to get everything in order, you may need to enlist the help of a commercial property management team. There are many things to consider when renting offices, from location, facilities and amenities, as these will all be important deciding factors as to whether or not you choose to set your office up in a rented office.
Deciding and understanding these factors can be quite difficult – committing to a rented office is a huge decision and one which should not be taken lightly. Everything must be considered. You must remember that a rented office space comes with added expenses, such as utilities and business rates, so a commercial rent surveyors will be able to help keep down and manage your rent payments and costs.
