Was leaning toward a store.. Just got a big shove!

So today I go to downtown Cary. Home of the posh boutiques, nice restaurants, upscale everything.. Even the Little Caesars is a bit classier here.

Here is the 788 sq. ft. space inside the largest space on the strip. The owner of the building wasn't expecting me, so I wasn't expecting to talk to him. But I did talk to a couple of the other shop owners. There's a very nice decor/flower arrangement (fake flowers) business. They are retiring, as the husband goes to seminary, and are closing their doors after 15 years at that location. I look at their inventory and the lowest price tag I saw on a non floral arrangement was $150. Had a short conversation with her. She said business has been consistent over the last 15 years. Most months are decent to good. But the impression I got was never better than good. Which is okay. One of the best things you can have for a business is consistency.

Second business is a flooring company. He's retiring in October. Has the front space with lots of window. I'm thinking possible move after he leaves. His story is much of what I would think in his business. Busy in the Spring/Summer. Fall off in the Fall and dead in the Winter. Says his busy time more than pays for his down time.

Third business is a olive oil bottler. She combines flavors into her oil. Quite yummy. She is quite new to the space, but reports good results. She makes sales based on traffic coming in for the other businesses. Come to find out, she's the owner's daughter. When I came in asking for the owner, she gave him a call. So now he's on the way.

Other businesses that did not have staff present were a bathroom/kitchen remodeler, mattress dealer (owner's gig) and a wooden bookshelf dealer for a local manufacturer (also the owner's gig).

Realizing I'm at risk of turning this into a novel, I'll cut to the chase. The owner shows up and is excited to see me! We spoke on the phone about my business and he seemed quite interested in having my business in his building. So there we are talking about the space, which he had planned to downsize his daughter's spot to rent to me. As we were talking about the space, I was looking around and imagining where things would go. Things were looking good!

Then he dropped a golden nugget into my lap..

He said "After getting off the phone with you, I was thinking about a way to get you more space for the same price." His proposal is to give up half of his space for his bookshelves and mattresses. My square footage would go from 744 to roughly 875. Same price, and a better layout. I would have a roughly 50 foot wall which is about 30% pegboarded and a 17ish foot wall in the back. Just 2 walls. There'll be a walkway between me and the owner's stuff, and I would have  to cut into my space a bit to allow people to walk through. Same rent. Includes electricity. Need a phone and internet. Magic Jack and cheap-o internet is plenty.

All this has me excited except for one thing. I have the cash to move in, the deposit plus first month's rent is in hand. What I don't have is my "oh crap" fund.. The fund that pays the rent if I can't make it. I don't know that I'm comfortable with the open and pray business model, especially since I'm using auctions to supply my inventory!

All this has me excited except for one thing. I have the cash to move in, the deposit plus first month's rent is in hand. What I don't have is my "oh crap" fund.. The fund that pays the rent if I can't make it. I don't know that I'm comfortable with the open and pray business model, especially since I'm using auctions to supply my inventory!

Why not go out on a limb?  Isn't that where the fruit is?  ~Frank Scully

Without at least a few months rent/expenses I'd be less inclined to do it.
Especially since first month of any business is usually a loss.   Figure a week or two to set up and get people to notice there is something new....expense of moving in....

Another red flag is the owners excitement.   Could be no one wants to rent there.  Why?

Your looking at a building that really only has two tenants.  The rest is owner.  Those two are "so-so"?

I'd have to get some money together first to cover several months at minimum.  Probably incorporate or LLC it so if things turned out bad he can't go after my assets....

Is he willing to do month-to-month?  Do you have enough high end items to fit demographics of neighborhood?  Able to staff it 12-14 hrs a dy, 7 dys. Week?   Is there other areas in your life you can cut out to cover rent (give up cable, storage unit, sell a car)?   Do you have capital to bid more units as you sell?

Would be cool to do but don't rush in.   Business plans take time.....

Well, before we go any further, if you don't mind me asking, how much is your rent going to be?

It's $844. The hours of the building are 10-5 Mon-Sat. Closed on Sunday. I would have a key to meet CL postings after hours.

While I understand the importance of having several months rent in advance, I think that this business had changed with craigslist, ebay and other sales outlets. Currently I only keep a few items on Craigslist and I would obviously have to ramp that up.

My wife just agreed to allow me to dip into another rainy day fund in case of emergency to pay the rent. That'll give me about a month and a half's worth of rent to work with. We also have about $2,000 set aside for her best friend's wedding coming up.. It's out of state, so there's some travel costs. I think it's a bit overboard to save that much, but it's what she wants, so...

I think the owner is excited because of the consistent traffic I could bring to his building. As of right now, he has no spaces open technically. But being that 3 of the spaces are HIS, I guess you could say that he's got a couple open. His major concern was the retiring floor guy in October and the immediate concern of the decor store closing at the end of next month.

My wife is intending on working with the decor store to consign some of their pieces that they can't sell to us after they leave. Not a bad idea.. But I'm sure after being in the biz for 15 years they have contacts of their own.. As you can probably tell, my wife is into the idea of doing this.

Of course, I could float money from my promo products biz into this one. Another positive to this space is I will have somewhere quiet to field calls from promo product customers. As of now, I take calls at home at the great risk of screaming kids from my wife's daycare.

Now for the update on the situation...

Today we were at the flea market and as of 4 p.m. made $2. We looked up at the sky and it was threatening rain. We decided to pack up and get moving. Before we did, I called the landlord at the other building to ask a couple of questions. While I did, the skies opened up. Leaving my wife running to cover anything that could possibly be destroyed by the rain. While she's doing that, she's screaming at me "we're f**king moving!" So, I have an appointment tomorrow to drop off the deposit check.

Nice.  Good luck to you!