Essential Shop Leasing Strategies for Shopping Centre Managers

Shopping centre operational strategies are a fact of property investment performance today. Local people and customers need to shop, and attracting them is important.

Most towns and cities have plenty of shopping centres to choose from, and that can create confusion. It is wise for you to have a shop leasing strategy or plan that is part of your business plan for the property.

Why is that? If you operate or own a shopping centre today, you must have a leasing strategy or plan to underpin your tenant mix and the overall property investment performance. That leasing strategy should be a part of the business plan for the asset.

Attracting Shop Customers

Shopping centre performance is all about attracting customers from the community, supporting the tenants with their small businesses, and optimising the income streams for the property owner or landlord.

With those three focus points, you can build a business plan for the retail property. Your shop leasing strategies can be at the centre of your real estate business plan.

Retail property ownership and investment is a specialised segment of property performance. It is perhaps the most complex type of investment property and should be a segment to be explored by people who are experienced in property investment optimisation.

There are many things to consider and optimise over time. Experience does matter when it comes to retail property function and performance.

Here are some ideas to help you with your overall leasing initiatives for the property over the next few years.

Review Current Tenant Mix

Keep in close contact with the tenants in the property so that you understand the pressures they may be experiencing and seek to resolve them. Stay ahead of the tenancy concerns and pressure issues relating to occupancy and business.

It is better to work with a sitting tenant on occupancy problems rather than see a vacancy arise. Not all tenancy matters can be resolved, but many can, and on that basis, your leasing strategies should incorporate close tenant contact in the future.

Boosting Income Cash Flow

Understand the income streams in the property so that the cash flow pressures can be well managed and controlled. There are rents and expenditures in various categories to watch and build your cash flow plan around.

Throughout the year, you can find changes in the regional or local supply and demand for retail shops and retail property performance.

Create shopping centre benchmarks or indicators to monitor as part of working with those changes. Those benchmarks can be vacancy rates, changes in the tenancy mix, and customer sentiment.

Shopping Centre Performance Budget

You can create a budget as part of a retail property business plan. That budget can be tracked monthly and quarterly throughout the financial year.

A budget will allow you to see where things are changing both in income and expenditure activity. A financial budget for the property will also allow you to reposition the asset when local economic pressures change.

Expect changes throughout the year regarding property ownership and investment performance. Today we see a significant degree of Internet-related purchasing in some merchandise categories. That shift does affect retail property performance and tenancy mix opportunities.

Set up a business plan for the asset to prepare for the different ways people own property and the pressures of the economy.

Tracking Retail Properties and Trends

Track and measure other shopping centres’ activities, vacancies, and operational factors nearby. As vacancies are occurring, those properties could also source other tenants for your property.

Many types of businesses exist today, and some are less suitable than others regarding shopping centre occupancy.

As you consider any new tenant for your retail property, ask the potential tenant about merchandise offering, retail sales experience, and the business’s financial backing or stability.

Tenant Leasing Changes and Pressures

Existing tenants in a retail property may face change pressures such as relocation, contraction, or expansion. Any thriving retail business will need to go through change every few years.

An experienced shopping centre manager will always stay in close contact with sitting tenants to identify those needing to reposition their merchandise activities and channels.

Shopping Centre Design Considerations

Understand your retail property’s design and customer usage patterns. Consider where most customers come from and how they move through the property.

Would you consider your property convenient and modern in its retail offering? One of the significant factors of concern today in any retail shopping centre function and its investment performance would be the method of attracting customers into the future.

Summary of Retail Shopping Trends

Without customers and successful tenants, any retail shopping setup will soon fail.

Changes in demographics within a suburb and all the directions of freeways and highways can shift the balance in customer convenience and access to retail property.

Consider all these elements as you consider improving occupancy and retail sales within a property.

Everything in retail property performance returns to the convenience and the experience the property presents to the local customers as they look for goods and services. Is your retail property well-positioned to improve customer interest and expertise?