Real estate management from both technical and economic point of view
Real estate management and life cycle management isn’t easy, but it’s extremely fascinating.
Simply reducing the real assets repair debt is no longer enough. In a modern-day environment, you need comprehensive understanding, smart, knowledge-based management, and the necessary skills to control complex processes.
How can you fit together real estate value management, technical quality, repair investments, overall management, economic viability, strategic goals, tenant satisfaction and constantly changing facility needs, and turn them into a single, easily manageable entity in a multi-property portfolio?
If you want to keep everything under control, you need clear goals and detailed indicators, but also the ability to look at matters from many different perspectives.
Read more below – you may find new insights!
Make use of our expertise – you don’t have to do everything by yourself.
Article summary:
- Real estate management starts with a real estate strategy – from clear goals to practical implementation
- Strategic, tactical and operational management
- A common pitfall – what are the lenses you view your real estate management through?
- Development of technical value vs. development of market value
- Fresher perspectives on the management of technical values and repair debt
- Real estate management: knowledge-based management and the right indicators
Real estate management starts with a real estate strategy – from clear goals to practical implementation
It’s a cliché, but it’s true: everything starts with a carefully crafted real estate strategy. Without a plan or objectives, real estate management can be challenging. How can you navigate without a clear goal in sight?
Once you have defined a certain vision in your real estate strategy for the property in question, you can start drawing up more detailed plans on how to achieve your goals. This way, you will know where you are heading also when making tactical and operational decisions.
Strategic, tactical and operational management – from goals to everyday work
The purpose of the strategy is to serve as a common thread behind decision-making and everyday activities. The goal is to align the entire real estate portfolio with the strategic goals from the perspective of management, values and productivity.
This calls for detailed indicators, data in a usable format, and the ability to see things from several perspectives. That is why many investors utilize the expertise of a reliable professional partner to support their decision-making.
Once the vision and goals for the real estate property are clear, we can start implementing the strategy on a tactical level. At this stage, we will examine your real estate properties portfolio by portfolio, measure your operations, and make use of the available information in decision-making and operative management.
In an ideal situation, the users of the property can enjoy a comfortable, sustainable and purposeful work and living environment, while your real estate portfolios meet both their financial and technical goals. This way, the strategy is visible on both the property owner’s desk and in the everyday life of the users of the building.
A common pitfall – what are the lenses you view your real estate management through?
A common mistake in real estate management is to put too much emphasis on individual indicators. This may occur especially when the maintenance strategy is unclear, the data available is incomplete, or people look at the issue from a skewed perspective. It’s worth asking yourself: What are the lenses you view your real estate management through?
Development of technical value vs. development of market value
The challenge of fitting technical and economic indicators together may occasionally emerge in real estate management. The conclusions may be very different from each other if you rely too much on a single viewpoint when making decisions. Both lenses are needed!
Do you view your holdings more through a technical or an economic lens?
Fresher perspectives for the management of technical quality and repair debt
When doing comprehensive real estate management, just monitoring the repair debt is not enough – you need to go a step further. Managing your repair debt is just one aspect of strategic management.
It’s easy to miss many other elements when focusing on your repair debt. For properties that need to be kept in prime condition, for example, the goals for both the repair debt and maintenance operations are higher than usual.
Of course, properties that will be developed in the next few years are a different matter altogether. For these kinds of properties, it may be strategically smart to consciously maintain a certain level of repair debt. As long as you can keep the repair debt under control, there’s no need to be afraid of it.
Instead of pure numbers, you should look at the state of your real estate property through a wider lens. An important and topical question that you should ask yourself is: How can properties intended for office use serve the users of the building after a long period of remote working? New kinds of needs and requirements for facilities have created a kind of suitability debt. From a technical point of view, the property is in good condition, but the facilities no longer serve their purpose.
These are just some practical examples of how merely examining the technical repair debt is not enough. You need to look at things from a wider perspective.
Real estate management: knowledge-based management and the right indicators
All decision-making should be based on the best possible information available, regardless of whether we’re talking about individual properties or real estate portfolios, or all the real estate assets that you have to manage. Sometimes you need to zoom in on the details, and sometimes you need to look at the big picture. You need the right kind of indicators for both the technical analysis and financial monitoring.
In addition to traditional indicators, you should also consider whether to measure the usability and comfort of the premises. Is technical management based on the objectives you have set for the property? Have you taken the needs of the users of the building into account in its management? It’s in everyone’s best interest to make sure that the facilities meet the users’ needs and that the level of management is in line with the strategic goals.
You don’t have to do everything by yourself
Measuring the right things and utilizing data in decision-making are areas of special expertise, and it may be wise to rely on a professional partner in these matters. When it comes to due diligence investigations and real estate transactions, a reliable partner that can support you in your decision-making is vital as well.
We at Conmer are passionate and professional about real estate matters – and we know how to switch between technical and financial lenses. We want to help our customers manage their real estate portfolio in an optimal way and help them achieve their strategic goals in a profitable, sustainable and secure manner.
Contact us – let’s take your real estate towards your goals together.
Expert:
Haidar Medallal
Head Of Real Estate Management, CEO
Conmer Oy