Your offices in Huntington Beach have
a leaky roof. Who is responsible? You
need to lease a warehouse in Houston. What are your options? You need to
finance a new plant in Georgia. How can
you leverage your assets and company
credit to save millions of dollars?
“A national commercial real estate portfolio can be a complex organism,” says RJ
Jesenski, senior vice president at Cresa
Partners Orange County. “Strategic planning
and the effective administration and management of a real estate portfolio spread
across the country or across the globe
requires a high level of real estate expertise.”
Smart Business spoke with Jesenski
about how outsourcing real estate services
can make managing a national real estate
portfolio a stress-free experience.
Why is it helpful to have an outsourced real
estate acquisition and management service?
Using an outsourced real estate team
allows companies to focus on their core
competencies. Specialized real estate management service providers maximize the
effectiveness and bottom line impact of a
company’s national real estate holdings.
These real estate advisers have a high level
of expertise and have established systems
for efficiently managing acquisitions, holdings and dispositions. Also, using an outside service for real estate needs allows
businesses to have a team of senior professionals that can expand or contract to meet
their varying level of real estate needs without an impact on overhead.
How can a centralized real estate service
help develop a strategic plan?
Partnering with a centralized real estate
service provider allows clients to formulate a strategic plan that effectively integrates changing business needs with the
company’s real estate assets. By carefully
evaluating a client’s business outlook,
skilled real estate advisers can work to fit
and tailor their client’s real estate needs.
This can include formulating a plan for
how to best increase square footage in certain target markets. It can also mean formulating a disposition strategy for down-sizing real estate holdings through subleases, buy-outs and the sale of excess buildings in other markets.
The highly competitive nature of today’s
business marketplace often requires simultaneous execution of seemingly opposing
plans such as the acquisition of space in
growing markets and the disposition of
space in contracting markets. An experienced single-source service provider with a
global reach typically provides the most
effective solution.
How can a real estate service provider assist
with maintenance of existing properties?
Specialized real estate advisers have the
technical expertise and information systems that include databases that can track
hundreds of leases simultaneously, including the detailed summaries of the terms
and conditions governing the landlord-tenant relationship in each lease.
These systems ensure that routine tasks
are completed accurately, including paying
rent, renewing leases, and reviewing landlord requests for additional operating
expense payments. Not only does this
reduce strain on companies’ administrative
staff, but also saves them money by avoiding late fees, the payment of inaccurate or
inappropriate charges and eliminating
administration inefficiency.
When maintenance issues arise, centralized real estate service providers can provide all of a company’s facilities with a single source to call.
Depending on the size of the client, real
estate advisers can also help negotiate and
implement national-level contracts.
How can a team of real estate advisers facilitate the purchase of new property?
Each company has a unique set of real
estate requirements based on its preferences and needs. A dedicated group of real
estate professionals that thoroughly understands a company’s real estate picture and
the industry’s facility needs can accurately
represent its clients and effectively negotiate contracts. Over time, a real estate team
has an intrinsic understanding of specific
clients’ requirements and standards. This
creates ever-increasing efficiency and profitability in real estate deals.
How can a centralized real estate service
provider assist with financing?
A centralized real estate service provider
will help a company create and follow a
comprehensive real estate acquisition
strategy that can save millions of dollars
through creative financing and sophisticated real estate transactions.
At the simplest level, if a business plans
to undertake multiple projects in different
states simultaneously, skilled advisers can
leverage a favorable transaction with a single national landlord for most, if not all, of
those projects.
At a more complex level, disciplined real
estate planning and implementation can
help companies leverage their credit and
real estate portfolio to acquire facilities
using creative capital markets financing
structures that literally save millions of dollars in facility costs.
RJ JESENSKI is a senior vice president with Cresa Partners
Orange County and has more than 20 years of experience in commercial real estate. Reach him at [email protected] or
(949) 706-6614.
