It's not easy running a corporate real estate portfolio. The challenges of managing the nuts and bolts of tracking important dates across different leases that are frequently written in different formats are daunting by themselves. Adding in responsibility for one of your company's largest cost centers further complicates matters. Capping off the challenge is the reality that what you do touches every one of your company's on-site employees every day.The right commercial real estate software package can make all of the difference for you.
Good commercial real estate software does more than just track dates and run simple reports. The best packages go beyond simple administrative and tactical support and cross over into being strategic tools to help you plan your entire portfolio. The combination of tactical and strategic support can help you spend your company's real estate dollars more wisely and grow your company's EBITDA.
Date Management
While strategic planning capabilities are crucial, your commercial real estate software also needs to get the basics, like tracking your option notification dates, right. An integrated calendar that shows all of the important dates for your corporate portfolio is a useful visualization tool that helps you maintain an overall view of your portfolio. Best-in-class software goes beyond this passive approach, though, and takes an active role in ensuring that you never miss a date by emailing or text messaging you to remind you of crucial lease milestones.
Benchmarking and Analysis
Benchmarking and analysis tools help you to compare your occupancy costs across your portfolio. Understanding these basic metrics equips you to make better business decisions about how to manage your company's real estate assets moving forward. However, looking at real estate metrics in isolation can be limiting.
A powerful benchmarking tool combines your commercial real estate data with your company's operational data. After all, a sales office that costs you $30 per square foot isn't less expensive than a $45 per square foot office if the latter one does twice the sales of the former. Many packages also automate site utilization surveys so that you can better identify which spaces are being effectively used by employees and which ones need to be reconfigured.
Market Comparisons
With the increasing availability of industry data, commercial real estate software packages can now go beyond your company's spaces and into the broader market. Paying $5.25 per square foot for property tax reimbursements for a Class A office space in a Midwestern market might seem like it's a pretty good deal compared to $10 per square foot in a major Northeastern market. If market data shows that the average for the first building's market is $4.50 and $11.25 for the second building, though, your view may change.
The integration of date management, benchmarking and analysis and market data lets you strategically plan your portfolio. While you are sitting at your desk, your commercial real estate software can remind you of leases that are up for renewal, show you what the perfect space's performance and configuration looks like, then show you alternate spaces in the market that may compete for your tenancy.
Visualization Capabilities
Providing raw data is no longer adequate. Your commercial real estate software can use mapping tools to help you visualize your spaces, how they relate to each other and how they relate to other spaces in the market. Overlaying real estate data on maps lets you see nearby spaces that you might not have otherwise considered. It can also help you identify efficiency and cost factors like traffic patterns or customer/vendor proximity.
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