There are many things to consider when you are looking to rent commercial space for your personal and/or business use. These include cost per square foot, length of lease agreement, location, furnishings and many more. One thing that you may want to negotiate is an upgrade allowance to up fit the space for your needs. This will allow you to install some simple things like energy efficient lighting and motion sensors that may help you save money in the future.

There are several other things that are often overlooked during this hectic time. Some suggestions of things that you may want to pay close attention to are utility bills, other tenants, comfort controls, maintenance agreements and power quality needs.

An often overlooked item is the cost of utilities at the particular site under consideration. First of all, it is essential to determine who will be responsible for utility bills. Is the space you intend to lease separately metered or are you proportioned a bill based upon the square footage you occupy? Who is responsible for utilities for common areas if you are sharing the building with other tenants? Included in this common area should be any exterior items that may be included in the utility bills such as exterior lighting and fountains that will affect electric and water bills. These are things that operate for long periods of time and will be a major part of the utility bills, so they should not be over looked.

If you are sharing the building, and your bill is proportioned based upon square footage, you will need to ask what other tenants in the building are doing in their space. One of the other tenants may have equipment that might consume large amounts of electricity even though they do not have a large amount of square footage. In this case you may end up paying for other tenant's activities. Some questions to ask that may help protect you from unexpected cost are "Will the utility bill be included in the rent, proportioned by square footage or sub metered?" and "What have utility bills run in the past for the leased square footage?" You may wish to ask for some historical billing data such as Figure 1 that may be obtain from Progress Energy's website or by contacting the account executive for the facility.

Figure 1 - 24 Month Plot of Electric Bills

Comfort of the leased space is another issue that needs to be addressed when considering leasing space. Heating Ventilating and Air Conditioning (HVAC) systems and the controls of the system will play a big part in the comfort and cost for the space. Comfort may be very important and you may not have control of the temperature or humidity to set the appropriate comfort level for the space. Below is a list of things that you might want to find out about the space.

• Is the spaced zoned?
• Is any of the space zoned with other tenants?
• Who can control each zone?
• Is there an automated control system?
• Are any energy saving methods (night and weekend setbacks) used?
• Who is responsible for HVAC maintenance and repair?

The answers to the items above will determine the amount that it will cost to heat and cool the space. If the space is not zoned you may run into a lot of problems down the road with comfort and possibly air quality. Things such as mold, mildew and VOCs can cause problems if the space is not conditioned properly and other areas of the space may be conditioned when it does not need conditioning. Depending on the way the controls are set up, the building may have zones controlled individually or they may be grouped together. Either way, you can save money by only conditioning the zones that need the conditioning and not the whole building.

Maintenance and repair was mentioned as part of the HVAC contract, but this topic should also be covered for the whole space being considered for lease. If there is a maintenance agreement with a company make note of the things that are covered under the agreement. Things that are not covered under the agreement should be discussed to determine who is responsible for those items. Things to look for in the agreement are light bulbs, air filters and different types of repair. This will allow you to plan for expenses associated with the up keep of the space.

Also, you should look at who is responsible for emergency repairs and insurance to cover damage that may be caused by this emergency. An example of this may be a broken water pipe. Who is responsible for the emergency repair of the water pipe and whose insurance will cover the computers that were damaged and the damage caused to the space?

Finally, depending on what you are going to be using the leased space for you may want to consider the quality of the power that you will receive in the building. The quality of power supplied may be critical to your operation if you have sensitive equipment. There are many things that can play a part in the quality of the power that you will experience.

If you are going to be operating a critical item such as equipment in a medical facility or running some type of computer or server that needs to be up and running you may need to consider power quality when choosing a location. Things that may affect the quality of power are location of the building on the power grid, types of facilities located on the same power line and other things that are going on in the building.

Choosing new commercial building space can be overwhelming. When choosing this space take the time to consider all the items mentioned in this article. If you need more information on power quality and possible energy saving methods, please check out the Progress Energy website.