Renting an office may seem like an obvious choice if you run a business. After all, you need somewhere for your employees to work together. In this scenario, we’re assuming that working from home doesn’t work well for you. You tried it, and it failed. You need office space, but should you rent it instead of buying or building somewhere to work?

In reality, renting does have some advantages, but there are a few significant disadvantages to be aware of. Here are three reasons NOT to rent an office for your business:

Rental payments aren’t fixed

When you buy an office, you will probably take out a mortgage. As a consequence, you’re left with mortgage payments every month. This seems like it’s the same as paying rent, but there’s one major difference.

Mortgage payments stay at the same rate until you’ve paid them. Well, interest rates can alter them slightly, but you can always remortgage, etc. The bottom line is that you have more control over the repayments. With rent, you’re at the mercy of the property owner. They can easily increase the office rent whenever they like – and there’s nothing you can do about it. In the space of a month, you can go from a reasonable rental rate to one that’s too costly for your business to afford.

You can’t expand a rented office

If you’re renting, there’s not much you can do to this space. Landlords are unlikely to grant permission to make improvements or expansions. Why? Because they know you won’t stay there forever. So, if you make changes to the property it could make the property less desirable for future tenants.

Instead, buying an office – or building one from scratch – gives you more control over future updates. You can contact a commercial construction firm to expand your office as your business grows and takes on more employees. Being able to do this is so beneficial because it’s more cost-effective than moving out and finding a bigger place to base yourself.

It’s harder to mould a rented office to your brand image

By all means, businesses have rented offices and made them align as closely to their brand as possible. You can mount signage outside to clearly show off your brand to passers-by. Unfortunately, your hands are tied in terms of what else you can do.

Will you be able to completely renovate the interior design to match your brand colours? Can you alter the exterior appearance to align with the image your brand wants to convey? Owning your office gives you more control over all of this. It’s the best way to truly take a workspace and mould it to perfectly fit your brand image.

The overall conclusion is that renting an office gives you less freedom and control over your workplace. Owning an office means you are in control of everything and can make the entire place look and feel however you wish. It’s also way more cost-effective to buy an office as you receive these benefits. You’re repaying a mortgage, but at least you’re getting something out of it. With rental payments, money is going to a landlord but you aren’t really getting anything beneficial from it.