Price your space accurately: Use Morning Start 10K Wizard: www.10kwizard.com
This is a great tool. Simply put, 10K wizard post leases that recently closed in the market place. The online resource enables a leasing professional to get the most recent real comps on rate, free rent, TI, moving allowance, reserve parking, etc.. A leasing professional can then strip away what he/she has learned from leases done in the past six months to analyze trends, price space appropriately, and make smarter deals. The one catch is in order for a lease to be posted, one side has to be public (either public company or public REIT).
Have a "best in show" Tour
The tour is the first opportunity to leave a great impression in the mind of the potential customer and his or her representative. A leasing professional cannot take these opportunities lightly and must ensure that each tour is "best in show". One recommendation to consistently have the best possible tour experience is to create pre-set budgeted “tour categories”. In honor of Tri season here is an example of different categories that could be used:
- Sprint Tour: 2-3K SF requirement. $25 budget. Starbucks waiting for prospect and representative, with $5 gift card to local Starbucks (to highlight local amenity). Set and scripted "pre-planned questions” for tenant and tenant representative. Good Homework done on customer and his/her business. Standard welcome sign.
- Half Tour: 3K-7K SF requirement. $50 budget. Starbucks and food waiting for prospect and representative (from local restaurant), with $10 gift card to local Chipotle (to highlight amenity). Deep knowledge of customer. Introduction to similar customers in building.
- Full/Iron Man Tour: 7K requirement or greater: $150- $300 budget. Senior member of building ownership present (Asset manager). Make sure best reserved parking spot is open. Welcome sign for specific customer. $100 Gift certificate for two to local restaurant. Plan for a current tenant to stop by during the tour to give raving reviews of the building.
The specific budget and game plan for each tour is a discussion to have with your ownership team. In the end, the goal with each tour is to create an emotional attachment to the building and specific space. You want your potential customer to walk away saying “it sure felt good to tour that space” and “gosh, they really want me in that space". We all have to understand that our prospects are going to look at multiple buildings on a given tour day and so it is a necessity to do the little things that make your space and service stand apart. Make sure you and your space are remembered. Finally, and most importantly, remember the tour is about the tenant! The potential customer cares more about how the space will support their business objectives, their employee relationships/hiring, and ultimately profits than anything else so the leasing representative will be wise to make sure those questions are always answered in the positive.
Response: Respond with Speed and Quality
Our response to a tenant rep's question, proposal, counter proposal, needs to be awesome. Responses need to be as fast as possible with the highest quality as possible. Using the same categories as before, a pre-set budgeted “proposal categories” can help achieve quality with speed:
- Sprint Proposal: 2-3K SF requirement. $0 budget. Normal proposal procedure with fast, friendly, and effective communication.
- Half Proposal: 3K-7K SF requirement: $15 budget. Proposal with really nice cover letter and cover page. PDF sent and a bound copy sent to Tenant Rep (going the extra mile).
- Full Proposal: 7K requirement to 10K: : $25 budget. Folder made with all questions answered before they are asked.
- Iron Man Proposal: Big Deals or Huge renewals. $550 budget. I-pad with an electronic version of proposal uploaded sent to the tenant broker.
Again, this is a strategy discussion to have with all ownership team members, but the most important thing is that we respond with speed and quality.
Use Google Ad-words
With our Governor proactively courting businesses outside the state this is all the more important. Anyone who searches “Class A office Space” should get a link to your building. For very cheap a leasing professional can buy ad-words on Google so the building or portfolio is at the top of the search engine when people Google. This can be done for more general search queries like: “Houston office, best office, best property management”, or for more specific queries like: “Greenway Plaza office space”.
Conclusion - Adding Value
Leasing office space is an art as much as it is a science. These tactics will hopefully create more opportunities , but it will take a savvy leasing professional to know when to walk away from a deal. A difference in $.50 - $1.00 in back-end rates can equate to thousands of dollars in value for a landlord. There is a great balance between securing occupancy and securing the most valuable and safe leases -- and a leasing professional should never sacrifice one for the other. At the end of the day, having more deal velocity and potential deals created from the strategies above will only add to negotiating leverage and to the end result of having buildings with higher occupancy and the highest possible value of leases. Happy hunting!
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