With the investment market showing a marked slow down and the credit crunch affecting the way in which Landlords and Occupiers approach their property holdings, the management and performance of commercial properties is being placed in increasingly sharper focus.
The Government and the European Community are introducing an increasing number of directives to ensure that commercial buildings are being run effectively i.e. Energy Performance Certificates. This places additional pressure on property managers to ensure that their properties are being run efficiently. It is for this reason I welcome the continued publication of Office OSCAR which has become the established industry benchmark for monitoring office service charges. This is the 24th year of publication and contains much valuable information about the running of buildings throughout the United Kingdom.
In the last year we have seen the introduction of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors Service Charge Code and Jones Lang LaSalle's OSCAR forms the foundation of the cost categories used within the Code. It appears that the large majority of Landlords have adopted the Code and therefore Occupiers can expect to see a greater consistency of service charge information provided by Landlords in the future.
Occupiers are additionally concerned to ensure that they are receiving 'value for money'. The challenge to the industry is to meet these aspirations and I believe that the data within OSCAR will assist Landlords in meeting occupier's expectations.
I very much hope you will enjoy reading Office OSCAR. A great deal of effort has been put into producing this publication by the Jones Lang LaSalle teams and on their behalf I would like to thank the contributors for the information they have provided.
Justin Snoxall Head of Business Group,
The British Land Company PLC
