Do I Need Office Space - When to Leave the Guest Bedroom
By VICKY BROWN
I know working from home feels uber convenient, but there are actually some very good reasons to consider relocating your business out of your home.
The first one is having a quiet, consistent time and place to work. When you’re working from home, it’s all too easy to let work time bleed over into personal time. And, as an entrepreneur, we trend in that direction anyway – we’re always on, always working – and if we aren’t working, we’re thinking about work. You have no idea how liberating it can feel to actually ‘go to’ work, and them come home ‘from’ work. That change in environment triggers your brain to transition from one mode to another. And change is really good for our brains. In fact, according to HealthyLiving magazine “The best way to strengthen your brain is to put it to work. The more you make it work, the stronger it becomes.”
A shift in environment also can go a long way on the creativity front. Altering where you are, what you see, and what you’re experiencing, stimulates your creative muscles
In person meetings with clients or staff can also be a real challenge when you’re working from home. First off, having work colleagues – either clients or employees – wedged into your personal home space can be uncomfortable for both you and them. Your home is your home, and while inviting someone in as a guest for a dinner party is one thing – requiring an employee to work at your kitchen table or in the dining room with your children, and pets, and partner, is a different situation altogether. And what kind of message are you sending to a client? It can read as not quite professional or ready for prime time. And after all your hard work, that is absolutely not what you want. You want to come across as impactful and established as you are in your head. And, it’s not a particularly enjoyable experience for your family either – to be banished from part of the house – after all, it’s their home too.
By the way, let’s circle back to employees for a minute. They need, and deserve, the proper space and equipment to do their work. The right chair, and a real desk, and maybe even a printer? Aside from the fact that you could be setting yourself up for a workers compensation claim, don’t you just want them to have the things that will produce the best work for your company?
Oh, and before you say it, a coffee shop still doesn’t quite fit the bill. Too noisy, too public – and don’t get me started about desks and seating. It’s perfect for enjoying your half calf latte, but not for producing a powerpoint presentation.
I can hear you saying, “But Vicky, I don’t have to have in person meetings – everything is virtual”. It may be a more virtual world, but even virtual meetings can be plagued by interruptions and bad internet connections.
“…do not, I repeat do not, ever want to use your home address as your business address…“
And that leads us to equipment. One real benefit of working in a non-home office space is access to the proper equipment and utilities. A strong, consistent internet connection is worth it’s weight in gold these days. And one way you can be sure that your teenagers’ streaming habits won’t freeze your client in mid negotiation, is to have access to commercial level internet service. And don’t underestimate the benefit of walking down the hall to the scanner or copier. In fact, even though most of my team has been working from home for the past 18 months, they still occasionally come in ‘just to print something’. Sure, you probably have a printer at home, but again, I’m sure it’s nowhere near the heft or speed of a commercial level piece of equipment.
One thing that people often point out in the ‘pro’ column for working from home is the home office tax deduction. Now, before I go any further, just a quick reminder that I am not, nor do I play, an accountant. So any and everything related to taxes should be run by your accountant. According to the IRS website, the two basic requirements for your home to qualify as a deduction are 1, regular and exclusive use (meaning for example, you use an extra room to run your business, then you can take a deduction for that extra room) and 2, it’s the principal place of your business. Again, check with your accountant to see how, and if, this deduction would apply to you.
But on the other hand, one thing that most people forget are how local laws might impact them. In fact, you may find that having your business located in your home is bending or outright breaking those laws. Most communities and cities have regulations that are related to home businesses, what types of businesses can be run from home, what zoning is required, and even revenue caps. In some cases, even condos and townhome communities have specific rules around businesses being run from their locations. So, it’s worth it to check into those guidelines. And in any event, your neighbors may not be thrilled with clients parking on your street, or groups of people coming and going, or numerous delivery packages cluttering up the post boxes.
So, I’m sure at this point you’re thinking, what am I supposed to do. Getting office space will be too expensive. And while it’s true, doing a full commercial lease for a suite of offices in a highrise, will cost a pretty penny – that’s not your only option.
You could go for a co-working space. I just did a quick Google search, and found a number of options in the Los Angeles area, some even with membership rates as low as $150 per month. The upside of co-working spaces is the flexibility and cost. You can get something as small as a space for your chair and a laptop at a communal desk, all the way up to a private office large enough for a few people. And you get the added value of commercial grade equipment and wifi connections. And there are services like DropDesk that aggregate your options under one umbrella, which makes for easy searching (and no, I’m not an affiliate, I just liked their platform).
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Or maybe you want something a bit more, something you can use in a variety of domestic and international locations. You could look at grabbing office suites from one of the big players like WeWork or Regus – their co-working arm is called Spaces.
And don’t forget the option of an actual sub-lease in an existing office suite. Many times companies will offer one or more offices, inside their suite, because they find they have more space than they need. The cost can be really attractive too – but you’ll want to get a commercial realtor to help you, because – well, contracts will be involved.
One last piece of advice. No matter what you do – from the very beginning, from day one, get a mailbox. My suggestion is to use something that’ll give you an actual street address, vs. a PO Box number. Many times you can’t use a PO address on official business forms. Something like a UPS Store can give you an address you can use everywhere, have someone on hand during business hours to accept packages and deliveries, and they can help with mailing too. Again, not an affiliate – but I really like the services they offer.
And here’s the biggest take away – you do not, I repeat do not, ever want to use your home address as your business address. As the years go by, and your company continues to grow, you’ll find that your business address will pop up everywhere. And it’s just not a good idea to expose your home address in all those places. Get an address, and phone number specifically for your business. In fact, Google Voice is a nice option on the phone number front, because you can use it anywhere, forward it anywhere, get transcripts of messages to your eMail and a whole host of other features – and it’s free. It’s a significantly better option than using your private cell phone number as your business number.
You know what they say, begin with the end in mind.
So plan for the future, for your future success. Give your business a good foundation you can easily build on.
And, get out of the guest room as soon as you can.