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If your office lease is expiring in around two years, the likelihood is that there is no immediate worry at the moment, which is what makes it such a useful point to start planning.
Starting early, even two years out, gives you the time to understand:
- What your lease requires
- Whether your current workplace suits the business
- The figures involved in finding an alternative
Today isn’t about deciding whether to relocate, refurbish or renew. It’s about knowing that when the time to make the decision arrives, the business knows what it needs.
First, know the dates and obligations you are working towards
A good place to start is the lease itself. Review it to confirm the contractual expiry date alongside any break clauses and other dates that can affect your options.
Establish whether the tenancy has security of tenure under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 or if that was contracted out. Renewal rights can vary significantly, which means it’s something worth clarifying with a property solicitor.
Doing this early avoids a scenario where an important deadline or obligation is discovered during the final months of a tenancy.
Work out what you will need from your next workplace
Use this time before the lease expires to look at how well the current workplace serves the business. Speak to the teams who use the space and garner their opinions. This exercise helps to highlight whether the existing office space, as is currently planned, is helping or holding back the way they work.
Plan ahead, too. Growth may be likely in the near future, which will affect working patterns and the way teams work together. All this will impact the usefulness of the existing space when the lease ends.
Qualitative and quantitative data such as this will allow a business to compare two routes:
- Renewing and refurbishing the existing office
- Finding somewhere better suited
These requirements also prevent an existing office space or an attractive new property from being the sole reason for making a decision to move or not.
Start putting realistic numbers around your options
Budgets at this stage don’t need to be set in stone. Their purpose here should be to establish how different scenarios could affect finances while there is still time to change the scope.
Staying might mean refurbishing a current office so that the business can operate for another lease term. On the other hand, moving to a new workplace may require an office fit-out before teams are ready to move in. Leaving existing premises may also mean a business is liable for repair or reinstatement obligations, something that should be checked in the lease before it is close to expiring.
At Office Insight, we recommend beginning a fit-out plan at least 12 months before the workplace needs to be ready, making this two-year window useful to define space and budget.
Two years out, the goal is clarity rather than commitment
The goal, two years out from a lease expiry, is to know which dates can’t be missed and what the business needs from its next workplace, be that its existing location or somewhere new.
This early groundwork leaves all options open, with enough time to investigate them properly.
The Office Insight Budget Planner can help to estimate the space you may require in a refurbished or new office space.
