This story is very similar for several of my clients, but we will talk about Nicole and her business partner today. Nicole had started her business in the past 3-4 years and was hoping to be able to purchase a building and move her business into that space as well as to have some room to rent out to other businesses. Commercial Real Estate can be a great  piece of an investment portfolio, when its the right property at the right price. That combination can be tough to find, especially in today's market. Many commercial properties are not priced to sell quickly, they are putting a high price and hoping that someone shows interest and gives an offer close to that. A lot of these buildings will have deferred maintenance or major repair work needed to be usable, and a lot of owners are not factoring those costs into the sale price. 

Nicole wanted a space to have some office space, some storage space and a showroom or workroom type area. Some of this would require a build out to convert any space into what her dream space looks like. The first step was to find out what she could afford, so I referred her to some of the great commercial lenders that I work with. After finding out their pre-approval amount we went to check the market to see what options were out there. Most of the properties were well outside of the range for now, but there were a couple that could have fit. After looking at the two options, the properties needed too much work and didn't quite have the ideal visibility that she was hoping for.

They wanted to be able to buy a space to start to grow their business and to earn more money instead of paying a landlord or someone else. It was important to them to set up roots and find a space to grow within their community, but to also be able to share their space with other compatible business or like-minded business owners. The sense of community and collaborating with other business owners was very important to them and they wanted to create something that could be like an incubator for new or growing businesses. Their mind and goals are in the right place, but the timing just wasn't right for them. We looked at all of the options and they  decided it made more sense to rent for now and build up their business, and then to be able to purchase their space in the next few years when they and their business are ready for that giant leap away from leasing and into owning a property.