As the economy slowly improves, a lot of previously vacant office space is now being re-leased at historically low rental rates. This is giving both landlords and tenants the opportunity to modify the manner in which square footage is measured for purposes of determining the rent. In negotiating leases, the parties need to know what standard of measurement will be utilized to set the rents. Landlords, and we hope most tenants, are familiar with “rentable square feet” and “usable square feet” as common concepts used in today’s leasing market. The concept of “load factor” also needs to be understood by both parties, as it allocates the common area expenses of the building to the tenants.
