Close Encounters of the CRE Kind.

The OfficeSpace team had the pleasure of hosting it’s first home town event for the CRE community in Seattle this past week. It was an intimate evening with an open format for answering questions on our broker services, product demonstrations, all of course while engaging with everyone on the latest commercial real estate talk in the Pacific NorthWest.

Perhaps the most surprising comment of the evening was how fantastic it was to speak with our team in person. More than once we heard “How often do you get to speak to a website face to face?”.  Being in the internet game with our heads down, working hard to make our site as efficient and user-friendly as possible for both the broker and the tenant communities, we sometimes forget how important that face time really is.

It’s a recurring theme in the tech start-up community as we “Eat. Sleep. Breath.” with our computers  and our “Eat. Drink. Learn” event was a great reminder to stop, drop everything and talk…in person.  We look forward to continuing this trend as we grow and continue to answer your questions – face to face, over the phone and of course, online.

A generous thank you once again to our sponsors, Gateway Construction and Complete Office Furniture who provided some fantastic give-aways and support of the evening.

We even managed to snap a few shots of the evening’s festivities as posted below.


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2013 Didn’t Bring An NBA Team to Seattle, But It Did Bring…

What does Seattle have?  A thriving start-up community and established technology hub, world renowned coffee, an infamous independent music scene, a top ranked NFL team, the lush green of the Pacific NorthWest and so much more.

Sadly, 2013 did not bring back an NBA team, but there is a game changer in town. OfficeSpace.com’s long awaited new platform is about to change the way players in the commercial real estate arena engage with clients.

In fact, businesses and commercial real estate pros now have a new online stadium with OfficeSpace.com’s improved site and service for the Seattle market.

Since launching its new service 18 months ago, OfficeSpace.com has served thousands of tenants looking to lease office, retail and industrial spaces.  OfficeSpace.com allows tenants unrestricted searches of its comprehensive database with over 27,000 properties, at no charge, something typically not done in the traditional commercial real estate world.

Today, we are proud to launch our free service in our home market of Seattle.  “We felt this was a great time to launch as the business community is thriving and there are a lot of eyes on Seattle right now.” says Susie Algard, CEO. 

Businesses can now search from over 7,000 available listings in the Greater Seattle area. We expect the number of tenants coming to access these listings will grow quickly, as we are the city’s only commercial real estate site offering this type of platform.

The new site has a clean design aesthetic with an intuitive, user-friendly map based search, photo rich listings, and advanced search filters, all of which were created to make the tenant search experience much more engaging and efficient.

“With today’s launch, we are excited to be bringing more qualified tenants to the broker community.” says Algard. OfficeSpace.com’s new site was designed with these relationships in mind. The commercial real estate audience can benefit from several complimentary marketing tools, including nationwide tenant rosters, a no-software flyer creator, comprehensive market surveys, and upgraded property listings.

So, while the city sits waiting patiently for another opportunity to bring back the NBA, we’ll continue to up our game to better serve the Seattle market. We’re no substitute for a basketball team but we’re practicing our virtual jump shots none the less in hopes of a CRE MVP title.

OfficeSpace.com is now serving Seattle, Denver, Portland and San Diego with upcoming markets on the horizon.

Broker Banter – Questions & Answers (The Portland Chapter)

We’re the first to admit we don’t always have all the answers when it comes to the fine details of leasing and all the questions that come with it. That’s when we turn to our commercial comrades to aid with the broadening of our knowledge base.  This week we’ve gone straight to the source to speak with Portland, OR broker Kristi Ricker.

We connected with Kristi to talk shop, and in fact, where to set up shop.

OfficeSpace: What do you think is the most important question a tenant should be asking, that they never seem to ask when looking for space?

Kristi: Zoning, tenants need to learn more out about zoning. There are so many issues in this area and if you’re not aware of this in the beginning it could hurt your chances of securing your ideal space. It’s something you should ask your broker about as they’ll be able to determine how to move forward in narrowing down your search. It’s just not something that’s on the top of your mind when you’re looking for a space and it definitely should be.

OfficeSpace: What is the best tip in negotiating a lease you think all tenants should consider? 

Kristi: The longer the lease, the better you’re going to be able to negotiate, especially if you are going to need anything done to your space. People are nervous with the idea of securing a 5 year lease, they think “What if something happens?” – but they can always put a clause in allowing them to sublease (A lease of a property by a tenant to a subtenant.).

OfficeSpace: What do tenants focus on, that perhaps they shouldn’t when searching for space?

Kristi: Recently, I’ve had clients who have looked at a space and were concerned the buildings around it were being worked on or unfinished. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always paint a pretty picture of the neighborhood, especially when it’s an up and coming urban area. I recommend looking at the bigger finished picture and inquiring about what’s being developed in the area.

OfficeSpace: What area of town would you recommend to a Start-Up in Portland?

Kristi: The inner Southeast, Northeast and North Portland are very hot right now. They were predominantly industrial areas and now they’ve turned into these very creative pockets with great opportunities for startups, restaurants, retail and more.

OfficeSpace: What are you starting to see more of in Portland?

Kristi: Tons of startups, restaurants, breweries, delis – there’s a great food scene here.

OfficeSpace: And lastly, what makes Portland great?

Kristi: Portland‘s so diverse, we have a little bit of everything for everyone. Everything goes here – that’s what I love about it. I see all these new ideas here and they seem to work. If you have a crazy, fun new idea, there’s a great support network for that here. It just seems out of the ordinary things work here more than other places. Nothing is guaranteed but your chances of making it a go seems to have better odds in Portland.

Kristi has over 15 years of real estate experience in the greater Portland area and has recently started her own company.

Need Office, Retail or Industrial Space in Portland? Visit us here – OfficeSpace.com/Portland

Connect at CRE Tech Intersect

The OfficeSpace.com team has been busy rolling out our services nationwide, albeit on a small scale as we embrace this unexpected turn of events. The goal was to roll out market by market but when tenants are searching across the country and the demand is there, it’s time to open up the flood gates. While we are still quietly focused on markets where we’ve seen the most activity, it’s been a breath of fresh air connecting with owners, developers, brokers, landlords in person at events like ICSC’s RECon, Sperry Van Ness’s Tech Den among others. (In fact, now is a great time to get ahead of the curve and add your listings to reach tenants as the summer season officially kicks off.)

This week we look forward to CRE Tech Intersect in San Francisco, taking place on Thursday June 20th from 6-9pm. The 2nd annual event brings together some of the most innovative tech companies in today’s commercial real estate market, along with a great line up of speakers, promising to be an exciting evening filled with insight into the following areas:

– What new technology will give you a competitive edge?

– How are today’s CRE technology firms changing to meet the needs of owners/operators/brokers?

– What are your competitors doing with these technologies?

We hope to see you there and look forward to sharing the latest from OfficeSpace.com.

Brokers, Are You Still Walking Through Buildings?

Gone are the days of walking from building to building…

Search online, anytime with the latest from OfficeSpace.com as we introduce the prospecting must-have for the commercial real estate industry; The OfficeSpace Tenant Roster. Here’s to finally accessing up to date, reliable and affordable information on buildings and tenants through out the country!


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Interested in Earning a Free Membership?

Refer OfficeSpace.com Tenant Concierge services.

We’ve built out a trusted network of vendors, featuring reliable service providers to help businesses manage everything related to setting up their new office, retail or industrial spaces. We built this service to help tenants who come directly to us asking for help. If you have a client interested in saving time and money by connecting with our Concierge, please send them our way.

By the way, our Tenant Concierge service has no hidden fees or costs – it’s a complimentary service aimed at making tenants lives easier!

Contact us for more information on how to earn your free Tenant Roster membership. John Heimbigner | heimb@officespace.com | (800) 560-3544

Calling All Tenant Reps!

So many inquiries, so little time

We’ve had a great 2012 and 2013 looks to be off to a fast start.  So much so that we are looking to expand our pool of Tenant Rep Brokers!

OfficeSpace.com has been extremely busy with our Portland, Denver, and San Diego launches and here is a brief summary of 2012:

  • Launched Portland, OR (Jan 2012), Denver, CO (June 2012), San Diego, CA (Dec 2012) AND
  • 243,000 visitors
  • 2,200,000 building views
  • 1,900 leads directly to listing brokers
  • Approx. 10,000 calls to listing brokers

We’re very proud of these results, however, we’re just getting started.

Destination for Tenants

OfficeSpace.com is where many tenants who are just starting to look for space first enter the market. We’re talking to these potential tenants, sometimes they simply request some marketing and listing contact information. Other times, these are tenants who are ready and willing to work with a Broker and this is when we send them to you. We are filling a void for tenants and they are finding us online.

Little Secret

As some of you may know, the OfficeSpace.com platform is open to nationwide listings even though we are focused on our home markets of Seattle, Portland, Denver, & San Diego.  In fact, we continually add new listings outside of our home markets and they are getting indexed.  In the last 30 days, much to our surprise, our non-home market web stats and lead activity has in some cases, surpassed our home market metrics:

  • 52% of visitor traffic was outside our home markets
  • 60% of our building views were attributable to our non-home markets
  • 30% of our leads & inquiries were generated from outside our home markets

The Opportunity

This is where you come in!

If you are an experienced Tenant Rep and would like to be part of our Tenant Rep Broker Pool, please email me at howard@officespace.com with a brief bio and I’ll be sure to contact you.  Oh, by the way, our Tenant Rep Broker Pool is free to join but spots are limited, so secure your first mover advantage and get in early!

If you have listings, get them onto OfficeSpace.com, you will get indexed, you will get exposure, and you will generate leads.

With your help, we’re making finding and leasing space a smoother and easier process!

So You’ve Leased Office Space. Now What?

That’s what we thought when we set up our new office. It was exciting and a proud moment but it also took valuable hours out of our day. We needed something or someONE to help streamline the process…fortunately for us we’re in the business of dealing with office space and all it’s intricacies and had a few tricks up our sleeves.

However, for those of you not privy to all the details, requirements and partners needed to effectively set up a new office space this can become the bane of your existence, in other words it sucks.

There are millions of sites out there to help with finding the right person for home improvements, in fact there’s a whole network (ahem HGTV) devoted to it. But what about those businesses looking to set up a new office, retail or industrial space?

Allow us to introduce you to our free OfficeSpace.com Concierge services. Did someone say “Free“? Yes, completely free services  – much like a hotel concierge is there to ensure a guest’s needs are met, our concierge is there to offer direction, advice and connections to the right people to get you up and running.

Why spend hours researching a general contractor or looking through endless quotes from furniture dealers for ergonomic work stations when someone can do it for you? Especially when that someone is an office set-up expert and has your best interests in mind.

How exactly does this “free” concierge service work? (We’re serious, it’s free…)

1. You’ve leased a new space – yay! Now what?

2. Contact an OfficeSpace.com Concierge and let them know what kind of space you have (office, retail or industrial) and it’s size.

3. Your concierge will then ask you a few short questions to assess what your company is going to need to get started.

4. Voila! You’ll receive a tailored list of qualified and trusted vendors eager to get your space open for business. (FYI – They’ll be expecting your call as our concierge monitors everything to make sure your office set-up runs smoothly.)

Can’t wait to get started – call your OfficeSpace.com Concierge today.

concierge@officespace.com | 800.614.2154

P.S. No office is too small or too big for an OfficeSpace.com concierge…

“Good Fortune Comes to San Diego Commercial Real Estate Community…”

San Diego, CA Friday November 9, 2012 – Commercial Real Estate’s latest game changer, OfficeSpace.com, is now officially available in the San Diego market targeting both brokers and tenants.

The company’s unique position to be the next generation, all access platform for office space aims to streamline the commercial real estate process.                                 

Having already garnered attention for their creative introductions in each market,  San Diego is no different with over 600 custom gourmet fortune cookies sent to the majority of brokerages through out the community with varying personalized fortunes.

OfficeSpace.com offers a multitude of services targeted to assisting brokers; landlords and property managers connect to tenants. The broker-and-landlord-to-tenant service is completely free for brokers and landlords to list. It also includes an extensive suite of free, timesaving tools created specifically for today’s market with options to design flyers, create surverys and communicate with tenants. Tenants are offered full complimentary access right at their fingertips with user specific designated search options, map functionality, social media sharing tools while also providing helpful tips on the confusing aspects of leasing.

“We are excited about providing service in San Diego. Tenants now have access to the  information they need to make better decisions about their businesses. We also provide a robust tool set for brokers in order to compliment their marketing efforts and connect them to tenants.” – Susie Algard – CEO, OfficeSpace.com”

About OfficeSpace.com

OfficeSpace.com’s innovative service will help add great value to the San Diego Commercial Real Estate Market. Other markets include Denver, CO and Portland, OR. To add a listing, find an office or find out more visit OfficeSpace.com.

History OfficeSpace.com
Experienced internet entrepreneurs Susie and Alex Algard purchased OfficeSpace.com in late 2010. Frustrated by some of the trial and tribulations of their own experiences trying to find office space for companies they were involved in, they decided it was time to make a change in the commercial real estate space. Susie, CEO of OfficeSpace.com, was previously a senior executive and founding member at WhitePages.com, a top 30 internet property.

OfficeSpace.com also operates one of the leading commercial real estate marketing and analytics services in Seattle, Portland, Denver, Minneapolis, Cincinnati & Columbus.

It’s a Beautiful O’Dea

Today is a special day for one of the OfficeSpace.com team members. Our own John Heimbigner is being inducted to the Athletic Wall of Honor at his alma mater, the noted Catholic Boy’s School –  O’Dea High School in Seattle, Washington.  John’s athletic contributions to the Fighting Irish soccer team led to a state title and continue today as Regional Director for Seattle United.

John will now join the ranks of other alumni who have received this well deserved award of distinction. It looks like you’re in good company John!

Congratulations once again to a true team player we’re sending you multiple high fives filled with pride! We hope you have a great O’Dea!

Movin On Up (Part 2)

Chalkboards and Chairs and Chartreuse Oh My!

Last Thursday was the big reveal for our new space! This was it, a sneak peek at our new digs. (Side bar – the biggest concern when setting up a new office always seems to be the floor plan aka “who am I sitting beside?”. It may be engrained in us from high school but that’s okay because we’re all about embracing our youth here at OfficeSpace.com.)

Potential Floorplan (open concept) w/ Chalk “Brainstorming” Wall.

Amongst the concerns we laid out in last week’s blog “Movin On Up Part 1” were – what to do with our office furniture and whether or not we should design the space ourselves. Well, it turns out the best laid plans are ones that involve doing a bit of both.

1. For our furniture/supplies dilemma, we referenced Pinterest obsessively and tried to incorporate our own furniture with a few creative ideas from Pinterest ie. Our Chalkboard Wall.

2. We also figured out the most efficient way to get rid of the furniture we couldn’t re-use was to sell it to our neighbors in the same loft space. We already share the same esthetic and neither party had to travel far for deliveries and pick ups.

3. Despite our own in-house decorating efforts we still needed a bit of assistance so we hired a local designer to help walk us through a few things. Keep in mind small budget doesn’t equal 100% DIY. We were still able to bring on a professional who could help tie everything together and offer some affordable solutions.

4. In keeping with our brand identity we’ve decided to add accents like throw pillows and desk supplies in our team colors while keeping everything else “Ikea” white. This keeps costs down, is easy to refresh and won’t look dated in a few years.

Next Friday is the actual move and we’re sourcing things like gently used boxes for packing (more enviro-friendly/economical) and looking at how to introduce ourselves into our new subleased space which happens to be shared by a large Seattle web based business who has been kind enough to offer us our new home.

Stay tuned for the finished product and a new look at Chez OfficeSpace.com.