I found out something that blows my mind, so I thought I'd pass it along. All I know about commercial real estate is what I have dealt with personally. I hope someone out there is reading this and can enlighten me to what I ma missing. Here is my history.
March 2006. I decide I am really really going to open my store. I start driving around looking for good places to rent. There is one on the side of a shopping center. Not great, but the right size and maybe a good place to start. So I call the guy up. I had dealt with him for a client on another space in another town regarding the lease, so I felt good about the situation. We start discussing amounts and stuff. He gives me a range of what the spot would rent for. We'll call this place spot #1. So I think about it. I also find an empty spot in another strip near me and I inquire to the leasing agent as to what it would run. I turns out that space is waayyy too big for me at present, but he has another spot available. We'll call this space #2. The problem with this space is that they currently have a tenant there who they are evicting, so we can't get into the space. It is a photo studio, so all I can see is the reception area. We drive around and find some other spaces, one being a building that is being rebuilt (space #3) and some others. I make inquiry calls to the others, but they are a bit ridiculous, considering what they offer. Most of these have remained empty or had spots fill and empty on a regular basis. No one stays long.
So, spots #1 and #2 are both in strips that can't be seen form the street and are on the sides of the plazas. One can bee seen driving in, if you don't look where you are going. #2 is behind a bank drive through. So neither are very good at all, but I am not in a position to be really choosy. Good spots are too expensive and I am just starting out. #1 is the better of the two choices. So I tell the agent I am ready to go forward. Could he send me the lease to look at. If I can get it at the lowest of the rent range he gave me, I can do it. Of course, it is at the highest of the rates ($8 sq ft more). I tell him no way. He doesn't even counter offer. He just says ok. 2+ years later he finally found a tenant for it.
So I focus more on spot #2. It is less than the lower range of #1, but it is really in a bad spot and I still haven't even been able to see how big it is. So, 3 months of back and forth on when I can see it. I am now 2 months from my projected opening date and he still can't let me in, but he wants me to sign the lease to hold it. I give up. I dig through my notes and find the number for #3, one I really have never thought more about. It is on a side street, but it is right on the street. I call and stop by to look at it. It is perfect. It is my current home and I have been very happy there.
So, now I am running out of room. I need more space to put more stuff out on display. I can expand into gaming, if I have a place for tables. I can get back issues out if I have tables to put them on. The best thing for me would be for the nail place next to me to move so I could knock out the wall and just expand. I have that in writing to my landlord, but I haven't heard anything yet. Their lease is up in July, so hopefully I will hear something by the end of the year. One way or another, I would like to know what is going on.
There is a big store that recently opened. A standalone furniture store went out. It is a 5000 sq ft store, 5 times as much as I have now. Now I can't afford to have my rent go up that much, but I figured I would at least ask how much it was. I contacted the agent with the big sign out front. I contacted him once a month for four months until he actually responded. His response was that they were in negotiations to lease it and thanks for asking. So, ok. I probably couldn't have afforded it anyway, but being big and standalone, I figured they may have trouble filling it and may like a tenant on the cheap.
Nothing has happened in it for a couple of months now. So I am driving by today and I see something in the windows. I look closely as I get near. They are McCain campaign signs. He blew me off to rent the place for two months.
I would have to guess that commercial tenants are not banging down the doors right now. Place #1 just rented the space I was looking at, but still has two empty spaces. Place #2 did rent that spot, but they have 2 or 3 open spots as well. A new strip is just about done being built. It was a thought, but it is almost double my current sq ft rate, so doubling my space would quadruple my rent.
I realize that a comic book store is not the most common of businesses, but I am doing very well and I am looking to grow. Wouldn't it behoove a leasing agent to at least give me the time of day?
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