Last week I talked about the requirements for industrial buildings from an investment perspective. This week I will summarise the attributes of good office space. The points referred to are by no means exhaustive as whole textbooks have been written on each type of property detailing what is required.

Office space has undergone a major transformation over the last decade or so. Previously, it was acceptable for a typical office lay-out to be dominated by an arrangement of small (and large) partitioned offices. Each office occupant had the luxury of occupying 40m2 or more of space, isolated from their colleagues by virtue of partitioning.

Clearly, this was not the most economic use of the space and it also gave rise to problems from a management perspective in terms of communications and compartmentalisation. When management practices started to emphasis the importance of team dynamics, the logical response was to create spaces where the team environment could be fostered. This ultimately led to the introduction of the now common open-plan office.

Today, new office buildings are designed around this principle with square metres per occupant down to single figures.

The concept has been taken a stage further overseas where hot-desking enables a number of users to operate from the same workstation at different times. To compensate for the obvious loss of privacy, partitioned offices are provided to allow for meetings and so forth. Again, instead of individual tenants each having their own cafeterias in their respective areas, modern office buildings will frequently have cafes and restaurants at ground floor level where building users can enjoy a break from their own space. Indeed, most office towers will now offer a full range of facilities from gyms to creche facilities.

Whether the space is in a tower or business park, one other factor will be of vital importance – car parking. This will service not only the tenant's staff but also visitors. In essence, you can never have enough car parks with an office use and buildings with a good car park space ratio to lettable floor area will always lease ahead of those which struggle to provide enough car parks.

Finally, in our fast changing world, those office buildings which are flexible in terms of being able to incorporate new technology will be sought after. Modern office buildings are now designed with this in mind and will have false flooring which is easily accessed should new fibre optic cabling or the like need to be installed. Similarly, they will be designed to achieve a green-rating meaning that they are constructed from sustainable resources and specifically designed with energy efficiency and the environment in mind. They are designed to reduce water consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. A good example is the new Meridian building on the Wellington waterfront which was one of three buildings awarded a prize in the New Zealand Institute of Architects 2009 Awards. The judges commented on its sustainable architecture praising its 'excellent light, ventilation and heating solutions. They also commented on the building as 'a really comfortable place for people to work”. The last comment goes to the heart of what any office tenant desires.

After all, we can spend a third of our lives at work, it should at least be comfortable.

Next week I will cover retail space, until then, have a great week.