How creative thinking & rigorous financial models can reduce property costs…

As New Zealanders we pride ourselves on our DIY can-do attitude and it gets us a long way.

But for a while now, business commentators have been challenging this approach saying the downside, particularly on the world stage, can be that a DIY approach is detrimental.

Our top businesses have it mastered, and in a number of arenas internationally we are building a reputation for quality. These leading edge firms have put their finger on harnessing innovation, using the “kiwi ingenuity gene”, and packaging products and services professionally to a high standard.

I believe we need exactly the same approach to property and managing lease portfolios.

There are great opportunities to strategise the future of a business, model a range of scenarios, and work future space and property needs into the equation. This is where the creativity and innovation kicks in and essentially applying some rigour to how we will approach the future.

This is not always an easy task, and some consider spending too much time trying to figure out the future as crystal ball gazing.

But I don’t believe this is the case. After a few decades in this game, I’ve put together some models, based on market experience and best practice financial & property management, that map out in detail a range of scenarios that might occur during the life of a lease over 5, 10 and 15 years.

As we clamber out of recession and look for ways to get some nutrients to the green shoots, it is timely to consider innovative ways to cut costs.

And with property always a high cost on the P&L, looking at innovative ways to manage and reduce this cost with creative thinking and rigorous financial models can provide opportunities for savings we have never considered. We don’t know what we don’t know!

Let’s get the context right and harness our proud DIY tradition, but recognise it must not descend into a “winging it” approach and must be tempered with detailed planning and execution.