Location, Location Location what do u think

[TallAdam85]

Location, Location, Location, is what they say when I comes to real estate but how much is it when it comes to a karate school. Would you pay higher rent to be in a shopping center or pay lower rent to be still visible but in a ware house, well this what I am dealing with. Currently I am out growing my dojo and my lease is almost up. I have 2 spots in mind one is $1700.00 per month and is next to a small movie theater and on the other side is a curves. Now my 2nd place I am looking at is the same size just it’s a warehouse that is on a Busy road, rent there is only 900.00 a month. Both of these locations are only 1 mile away from my current place. Now most of my student think I should move into the spot with the theater, while I like both place just want to get some other school owners point of views.

 

[Nomad]

Think of the difference in yearly rent in terms of how many students it takes to pay for it, and then look at your total enrollment numbers. If you need 10 more students to pay the rent on the place in the shopping center, and your current enrollment is 30 students, I definitely would go with the cheaper place; if you have 250 students, go with the more visible. In between gets tougher, but you get the idea.

We recently went through this, and moved from a very visible location that we'd been in for ~12 years in an expensive mall (that decided to basically double the rent) to a larger, but much less expensive location off the beaten path a few miles away. As far as I can tell (don't actually have access to the books), very few people stopped attending because of the move (distance, inconvenience, etc), and I think we're enrolling new students at around the same rate as at the other location (mostly through word-of-mouth, friends of current students, etc.) In other words, I think our enrollment is as strong as ever, but we're saving a huge amount on rent, which makes for a much better bottom line.

Good luck with whichever decision you make!

 

[Frostbite]

As sort of a tangent off what Nomad said, I'd look at how much traffic/enrollment you get from people who just happened to drive by versus other forms of advertisement like word of mouth, website, Yellow Pages, etc. If a significant amount of your students arrive at your school from just seeing the big neon Karate sign then location might be a bigger factor.

 

[Drac]

Personally I'd go with the less expensive one...With the money you save you can invest new equipment....

 

[TallAdam85]

well the thing is half of my students are word of mouth other half are from the drive by and seeing so i will try to bargain with both and get the best deal and hopefully best spot will keep you guys posted

 

[TallAdam85]

well went to the city today to talk about the warehouse spot they said to get "a speical land permit" that it would cost $2200 just for the permit. so Looks like that warehouse idea is out. they said other citys have different rules so maybe move to thew next city

 

[terryl965]

Ask them of you go under general assembly, is there still that charge.

 

[TallAdam85]

the book said that martial arts/ gymnastics can go into warehouse, but then you have to get the speical land use permit witch sucks!

 

[TallAdam85]

today i met with my current landlord and he did not want to lower my rent at all reason why i tried to get it down is in Michigan there is alot of spaces for lease but my current land lord would not budge and 2nd I am startting to out grow my current location but i was thinking i be ok for 1 more 1 year lease but the land lord said 2 years only he is a dick so looks like i am going to have find a bigger place.

odd question are most land lords just a pain in the butt? or just about half?

 

[tshadowchaser]

Visibility may bring you more students if you can afford the higher price.
If you are worried about the cost look hard for a less expensive but maybe less visible place and then put adds in the telephone book, paper (GRAND OPENING), etc.

 

[TallAdam85]

well see it is a toss up for the nicer place i just need to paint it and put my mats down and i am ready to go but if i move into the warehouse alot of work needs to go in as well as money so thinking it be close to the same about for the warehouse after the repairs as well as montly adds to get people in.

 

[simplicity]

Being from Michigan myself. I would think that the owner of your building would want to have someone paying rent, than having his building empty. How is your approach? This may or may not help you. Something to think about.


E-mail me at ctr1964@aol.com


Keep "IT" Real,
Sifu John McNabney

 

[TallAdam85]

had my realtor contact one of the buildings and the warehouse have one of my students who nocations for a living contact them
lol i can't spell