Commercial Real Estate Business All Set to Explore the New Walk from Home Trend

These days most of us prefer our workplace to be situated near our homes. The nearer your office is located, the easier it becomes for you to commute. That’s a truth that you can’t ignore isn’t it?

The benefits are that your commute time is reduced and your regular routine is also changed. You get time to walk on your feet to the office and promote creativity as well as engage yourself in civic activities.

As the world is slowly and steadily evolving and getting adapted to the style of work from home amidst this deadly disease stricken world, people are being restricted to their homes, which is not a permanent solution for professionals.

Most companies wish to have an office where all employees can work together and be part of a larger team.

This is why companies are taking a closer look at various models and concepts for their employees.

Companies Have Introduced the New ‘Walk From Home’ Trend

Companies try to maintain strict safety protocols for the employees, and corporate have begun to introduce the trend of ‘walk from home‘ or ‘work near home‘. It saves a lot of travel time, increases productivity up to 10 times more and also looks after the safety of the workforce.

Ashima Bhat, the Group Head of Business Finance and Strategy, Administration and Infrastructure – HDFC Bank said in a recent interview that “the fear of “Covid-19” has opened up new working styles that had not been explored till now.

Various factors like business continuity, reduced public transport, social distancing norms etc. play an important role in the various business decision making activities for the future. The work from home concept is not suitable for all professions, specially the banking sector. Some industries just can’t function with the work from home concept. In that case, the satellite offices turned out to be extremely beneficial for ensuring employee safety.”

Ashima also said that “during the lock-down, the HDFC Bank Palava office ran business as usual, their work was not hindered as a large part of their workforce could walk to the workplace which was situated in the township where they were residing.”

A recent survey conducted by Cushman & Wakefield on 40,000 working professionals suggested employees miss the bond with their colleagues while they work from home during the pandemic. The corporate would encourage 40% of the workforce to work remotely, but the rest of the 60% must report to work. For this 60%, corporate will look for bigger workspace and move into mixed-use developments where employees can ‘work near home’.

Gautam Saraf, Managing Director, Cushman & Wakefield, said, “To mitigate the COVID-19 risks, offices will adjust to new routines like rotations and lower seat densities. In metro cities like Mumbai, where social distancing is impossible while commuting, employees will be at high risk of exposure. In such a situation, the satellite office model will work as a perfect solution. The integrated townships have the offices and employees in the same radius. This reduces the need to commute over longer distances, the single biggest challenge in resuming work while managing COVID-19 in the workplace.”

As the consumer behavior keeps changing over time, developers are focusing on designing smart complexes and modern townships with the offices situated within a walking distance. The enterprise owners who rent or buy these offices will always seek out intelligent solutions and try to be part of a safer environment with all facilities available on the doorstep.

Developers Are Keen On Developing Integrated Townships in All Large Cities

The Managing director of Cushman & Wakefield, Mr Gautam Saraf further states that ” Many large developers are already ready with integrated townships in adjacent areas of Mumbai like Palava with its Walk-from-Home program and in Bengaluru like the Bhartiya, Hinduja near the airport), providing well planned cost effective solutions to employees as well as employers. This will not just provide a walk-to-work program to the employees, but the developments also aim at offering a high quality life to them at a pocket friendly budget, hence making it a long time viable proposition. This new style of dispersed office models will be considered as part of their evolving real estate strategy and such integrated projects will be in more demand in the future.”

Indian cities like Bengaluru, Pune, and Hyderabad are the first cities to adopt the work near home cultural phenomenon in India.

The much renowned CEO of Townships and Rental Assets Shaishav Dharia, recently said that several socio-economic and logistical advantages are being provided by this new “Work Near Home” model with satellite offices across locations. Which might not have been possible otherwise.”

What do you guys think about the new culture of work near home? It will not just help reduce the commute time but also take care of your mental and physical well-being by encouraging walking as an everyday exercise, as well as promoting creativity and civic engagement. The profit oriented real estate business is all set to de-densify, with more and more office spaces situated within your walking distance, further increasing the demand amongst corporate for satellite offices.