Tenant Representation At first glance, it sounds like a decision that doesn’t make much sense.
Why would a company sign a lease for a new office while it was still paying for the one it already had?
For Elective, a U.S.-based education financing company, that question shaped the entire search.
The team had outgrown its four-person WeWork office, but there was still time remaining on its agreement. Waiting until that commitment expired was the obvious option. It was also the safest one.
But the real question wasn’t whether paying for two offices was ideal. It was whether the temporary overlap was worth securing the right long-term solution now.
Any move would have to solve enough problems to justify the additional cost.
Elective’s brief was specific: furnished, move-in ready, tech-forward, pet friendly, downtown and within a defined budget. The company also needed room to grow without taking on the cost and disruption of building out a new office from scratch.
That narrowed the field quickly.
Good Advice Doesn’t Always Lead to a Deal
The story actually starts more than a year before Elective entered the picture.
Harris Sheldon and Luca Antongiovanni had been introduced to another business owner who was considering a move. After reviewing the market and the options available, their recommendation was simple: stay where you are.
There wasn’t a transaction to be made, but it was the right advice.
The relationship continued, and months later that client introduced Harris and Luca to Elective’s CEO, John. If they were willing to recommend staying put when moving didn’t make sense, he trusted they would take the same approach with Elective.
Roughly three months after that introduction, Elective had signed its first long-term office lease.
Making the Economics Work
Finding the right office was only part of the challenge. The deal also had to work financially while Elective was still carrying its WeWork commitment.
The solution involved a more complicated structure than a conventional lease.
Elective initially occupied the space through a sub-sublease before transitioning into a direct head lease. That required coordination between the existing sublandlord and head tenant, the landlord, Elective and the FLOORSPACE team.
The mechanics were complicated behind the scenes, but the outcome was straightforward: Elective could move into a furnished, fully built-out office immediately, avoid a significant upfront build-out and keep its occupancy costs within budget despite carrying two offices for a period of time.
From the outside, it looks like a single lease.
The structure behind it is what made the move possible.
Availability Isn’t the Same as Choice
Elective toured roughly a dozen offices during its search.
There was plenty of availability across the downtown market, but far fewer spaces that actually fit the brief.
The office Elective ultimately chose was well located, professionally built, furnished and ready for immediate occupancy. Those attributes made it attractive to more than one prospective tenant.
That distinction matters.
A market can have significant vacancy while still offering relatively few spaces that are genuinely competitive for a particular company. Once requirements such as location, condition, furniture, technology, layout, timing and economics are layered in, the real choice set can become much smaller.
For tenants, headline vacancy only tells part of the story.
From a Four-Person WeWork to a Four-Year Lease
When the search began, Elective wasn’t necessarily looking for a permanent office.
The original plan was to find a short-term solution that could bridge the gap until its WeWork agreement expired. After that, the company could revisit the market when the timing felt more comfortable.
That isn’t what happened.
Once Elective found the right space, the team saw an opportunity to solve more than its immediate space problem. What began as a search for an approximately 18-month bridge became a four-year commitment.
The office gave the company room to grow, while future lease expiries on the same floor may create additional expansion opportunities if that growth continues.
For a company moving from a four-person coworking office into its first long-term lease, that flexibility mattered.
Sometimes Waiting Costs Something Too
The most interesting part of the transaction isn’t simply that Elective signed its first long-term office lease.
It’s that the company was willing to question the assumption that one real estate commitment has to end before another can begin.
Waiting would have avoided a period of overlapping occupancy costs.
It also would have meant giving up the office Elective wanted and hoping that something comparable was still available months later.
The company decided the certainty was worth the temporary cost.
Sometimes the best real estate decision isn’t the one that eliminates every short-term cost. It’s the one that puts the business in a better position over the long term.
