Furnish to the corporate standard or the traveler standard

Question

I've been pricing out two furnishing packages for the same 2 bed unit and the gap is wider than I expected. The traveler package is around 6k, warehouse store beds, a couch that will die in three years, one set of pots, a folding table for a desk. The corporate package is closer to 16k, real desk with a real chair, matching case goods, art on the walls, dishes that photograph well.

The argument for the cheap package is that a traveling nurse on a 13 week contract wants a clean bed, working wifi and parking. She isn't paying a premium for the credenza. Depreciate the whole package fast, replace it when it breaks, and if the strategy stops working I've only sunk 6k.

The argument for the expensive package is that corporate relocation and insurance placements are the tenants with budget approval behind them, and those are the ones who look at photos and compare. A furnished unit that reads as furnished-cheap gets sorted into the bottom of the pile and sits between tenants, and vacancy costs more than the furniture gap in a couple of months.

The part I can't settle is whether the corporate tenant actually exists in a mid-size market or whether I'd be building for a tenant who never calls. If 80 percent of my inbound is healthcare, the 16k is decoration.

karen_whitfield · Answer

I'd go light and let the market tell you what it wants. Every furnished unit I've watched friends run ended up serving whoever was actually in the area, and in most secondary markets that's healthcare and construction crews, not relocating executives. You can add a desk and a better mattress in month four for eight hundred dollars. You can't get 10k back out of case goods you bought for a tenant who never showed up.

The part of your framing I'd push on is treating the furniture as the thing that decides placement. Response time and the photos do more work than the credenza. A light package shot properly in good light beats a nice package shot at dusk with a phone.

One thing to watch on the cheap end. Beds and couches are where complaints come from, and a bad mattress will show up in every review and every repeat referral you don't get. I'd buy those two items at the corporate standard and buy everything else at the traveler standard. That's not a real answer to your poll, so I picked the middle.

Furnish to the corporate standard or the traveler standard

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