You know how important lease administration can be for your business' bottom line. Keeping track of your responsibilities, of your landlord's responsibilities and of critical dates is a challenging job that, if left undone or done incorrectly could easily cost your company thousands or millions of dollars. A mistake could even impact your ability to continue occupying your space.
Although keeping track of your real estate is a business-critical activity, many real estate administrators fail to create a robust system to help with the process. Many of them simply set up an Excel spreadsheet or a Word document and enter data from their lease abstract. After all, you already have a copy of Microsoft Office sitting around, so it's easy and cheap to get started. Plus, if it's all in a document, you can get to it when you need it, right?
Lease administration via Excel has a number of severe drawbacks. These drawbacks have consequences that can seriously impact your business.
Excel Isn't a Lease Administration Tool.
This might seem obvious, but Excel's main benefit -- its flexibility -- is also a main drawback. You will need to spend valuable time creating a lease tracking spreadsheet from scratch. While you can create a quick-and-dirty sheet to enter dates quickly, even if you spend tens or hundreds of hours to create an elaborate system, it will never be as functional as a dedicated software package.
Excel Isn't Integrated With Your Calendar.
While it's easy to enter dates into Excel, what happens if you forget to check your spreadsheet and miss a date? You'll have to double enter important dates and reminders -- once into Excel and once into your calendar. Not only does this take more time, but it also doubles the chance that you will make a mistake and miss an important date.
Excel Can't Export Standardized Data.
If you need to share lease administration data, you can send your Excel file, but if the other party's software can't understand the layout, they won't be able to import it.
Excel Doesn't Analyze or Report.
Which of your sites is the most efficient on a cost per square foot basis? How much will your rent go up across each site in January? While it's possible to pull this out of Excel by doing your own analysis, lease administration software automates the process and lets you get access to more data in less time.
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