Tech Space In CityWestPlace Offers Bridge For Small, Growing Companies
When startups gain traction and start to experience success, they face a real estate chasm—too big for an incubator, too small for a big-boy lease. Enter Tech Space. The co-working provider coming to CityWestPlace in Westchase wants to be the bridge small, growing companies need, offering short-term flexible leases at best-in-class assets. Bonus: They could prevent future sublease overflows.
Tech Space CEO Vic Memenas (speaking above) was on Bisnow’s Future of Westchase panel to discuss the new leasing concept. Vic and his team want to solve real estate problems for small business owners, specializing in tenants with less than 70 employees. Vic’s found that going through the leasing process can be extremely burdensome for small businesses in capital as well as time. When you have a limited number of employees, having one spend an entire day handling leasing is costly.
Parkway managing director Mike Fransen (speaking above) has experienced this struggle firsthand. Mike said he’s heard of potential clients renting apartments to run their business instead of getting an office lease. He admits there are very few mechanisms in place to capture that level of business.
PMRG VP Michael Sieger (below, with PMRG's John Spafford) shared a broker's perspective. Of course, every broker wants that big lease with a long term and fat commission, but at the end of the day, it’s about servicing clients. Michael thinks brokers will adapt. You help a growing business sign a smaller, short-term lease now, so down the line they come back to you to sign that big lease. Being able to offer the type of short-term, high-quality leases like those at Tech Space is another arrow in the quiver. Mike says more options in office leases helps maintain the business of that client through their life cycle.
The appeal of spaces like Tech Space aren't just what they can do for your bottom line. Vic’s learned from his time working around tech that success has less to due with your balance sheet and more to do with the type of talent you can attract. To attract the caliber of candidate you have to offer best-in-class amenities and a place people want to work. CityWestPlace does just that, and its location can pull from Houston's diverse, highly educated population. The campus environment helps small business offer the same amenities their giant tech competitors are offering.
With more leases like those at Tech Space, Mike Fransen thinks we can avoid flooded sublease markets. Without smaller, short-term leases like those being offered by Tech Space, companies may bite off more than they can chew, eventually spitting it back out on the sublease market.
