Frequently Asked BOMA Questions

We have a lot of BOMA expertise in our company. We have been surveying buildings for over ten years. One of our founding partners, John Zsolt, has been involved in the creation of the measurement standard. Over the years we have come across every possible situation you can imagine.

In order to share some of this knowledge, I am starting a new feature on this blog. 'Frequently Asked BOMA Questions'. We'll do a couple at a time and then compile them all onto a separate page later on.

Here are the first two - along with the answers:

• "What is the difference between usable and rentable areas?"
  
  • Usable area refers to the area within the suite that the tenant has exclusive use of.
    
  • The rentable area is greater than the usable. It takes into account a share of the common areas of the building that the tenant shares with other tenants. These areas include a share of corridors, lobby and washrooms that other tenants use.
    
  • In simple terms, the usable area is the size of the tenant's private space while the rentable area is the area on which rent is charged. The landlord has the right to recover rent on all the area in the building including shared spaces- corridors and washrooms are not free!
  
  
• “Why do I get a different number when I measure with a measuring tape?”
  
  • The BOMA standard has rules that define where area is measured to. For example, measurements to walls that separate suites are deemed to be taken from the middle of the inside of the wall. Walls adjacent to corridors are measured from the suite side of the wall in most cases.
    
  • When surveyors measure a building, they measure all the spaces and locate both sides of all walls. They then use the standard to determine where the area lines are located.
    
  • When you measure the inside of space with a tape measure, you will find that the area is slightly less than the surveyor's calculated usable area. And your measured area will be significantly less than the rentable area because you are not including any share of the common areas.

Thanks to Virge-Kai Lindaja for these first two questions. Look for more FAQ soon!

SEO for Commercial Real Estate

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the art and science of getting your content found on the internet. There is a vast amount of advice online on this topic so I won't repeat it all here. Google for more detail!

I'll just list some basic points that will help a page for a building be found on the web.

• Put the building name and address in the < title > tag of the page. Google pays extra attention to this.
  
• Put the name and address in the building in < h1 > (headings) tags on the page.
  
• Don't use images or flash to display important text information as search engines won't see it.
  
• Use the same words that people are likely to use in a search in your text description such as 'office space', 'commercial space', etc… Consider using a tool like Google Analytics to discover the search terms that your visitors are using.
  
• Make sure you include the name of the city, street and neighborhood in text on the page.
  
• Don't bother about the keyword meta tag. Search engines ignore these because they have been abused.

Now, that you've got someone to your site, how do you make sure they read what you have to say?

• First of all, keep your text short and simple. Research shows that people do not read web content, they scan it.
  
• Provide lots of pictures of the building inside and out.
  
• Provide an interactive map with neighbourhood features and amenities. Let your prospective tenants explore the surroundings.
  
• Show what space is available and let your visitors help themselves to information. Provide plans of available space.

The more you can help your prospect imagine moving into your building, the more likely they will be to go to the next step: pick up the phone and call!

3D Plans

Do you know anyone who has trouble reading plans? It's a very common problem, but it's one of those things that people don't like to admit.

What do all those lines represent? Even for trained professionals it is hard to precisely judge what a space will be like. What if there were a better way to communicate the layouts of your available space?

Space Database can enhance your marketing drawings by including 3D renderings. These models translate sometimes obscure drawings into something more easily understandable. Because we already have your building documented in CAD, it is simple to expand it into a three dimensional view.

Make your available space stand out in 3D!

The Distribution CAD File

This post is specific to Space Database users. It won't make sense to anyone else - sorry!

One of the key file types that Space Database manages for their clients is the Distribution CAD File. This can be a bit confusing because there is another CAD file under each floor called the Master CAD File. What's the difference?

The Master CAD File contains all of the information that is used to generate Space Database data. It contains area lines. It contains several title blocks and it contains tenant names and areas. It's a secure file that should not be distributed. You may have noticed that it is not visible to all users and the email feature is disabled on this type. You would never use this file outside the property management organization.

But CAD is very useful for other consultants. If your tenant needs to reconfigure a space or if a prospect would like their designer to work up a feasibility study. An accurate and up-to-date CAD file will speed up the process immensely.

We created the Distribution CAD File for this type of use. It is a file you can confidently distribute to help your tenants' consultants speed up work. It does not contain area lines, tenant names or anything else you need to worry about.

These drawings are very useful to designers. By providing these files, the landlord can drastically reduce the time required for the assessment and feasibility phase of the leasing process. Once a lease is signed, the time to develop working drawings is also reduced which means that the tenant will be paying rent sooner.

Make sure you distribute these files and get them working for you!

Google Latitude

Google came out with this this new tool yesterday and I immediately signed up. Latitude is part of the latest version of Google maps for mobile phones. It allows you to share your location information with other Google users as well as see the location information that they share with you. I was skeptical it would work on my phone as it was an older BlackBerry Pearl without GPS functionality (as far as I knew). It was a very easy install. Click here for instructions. It works very well and apparently uses the cell network to approximate a location. The blue circle on the map indicates the area of estimation. It's very easy to invite other users and it's fun to watch them move around the city. A neat feature is that the app allows you to 'set' your location manually - you are not compelled to be honest!

You are not restricted to using Latitude on your phone. This screen-shot is from my iGoogle page where Latitude installs as a widget:

This is a great tool for friends and family to stay in touch and it will be a very handy tool in a business like ours where consultants move around a lot from site to site.