The year of the "co": From WeWork's hit to the interest of coliving in Spain

January 4, 2020
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This article was written and published in Spanish and has been translated into English via Google Translate. Click here to read the original article.

2019 was a year of ups and downs for coworking, and a great year for coliving.

In the case of shared offices, the lights respond to the good state of health of this type of business and its more than evident expansion throughout the country, while the shadows have to do with the crisis through which the maximum exponent of coworking: WeWork. For its part, coliving continues to attract more and more operators, such as Quarters or MiCasaInn, which have put Spain in their sights this year to continue growing.

With a coworking space in almost every corner, the excessive expansion of some operators around the world has taken its toll, even in Spain. This is the case of WeWork, which started the year with defined growth and business plans and saw itself as blurred by not convincing its investors at all: from canceling its IPO to terminate contracts with some of the owners of the buildings where they have installed their coworking spaces.

It was the case of the contract that he was going to sign with Hexagon Building, located in 22 @ of Barcelona, ​​which as idealista / news advanced, declined at the last moment. Here, WeWork was going to open a space of almost 2,000 m2. This decision impacted the sector in Spain, as it was an operation that was closed since mid-year.

WeWork has continued galloping in the midst of its crisis, trying to continue operating normally while the market continues to cast doubt on the group. The company, to try to stop its problems, has initiated a workforce cut in the United States that will affect 2,000 workers worldwide, 16% of the workforce.

In October, SoftBank took control of 80% of WeWork shares, which finally canceled its plans to go public, and injected 10,000 million dollars (8,960 million euros) into the operator. In addition, the agreement meant a reduction in the value of the company up to 8,000 million dollars (7,100 million euros).

In addition, WeWork's Chief Executive, Marcelo Claure, would have explained in an email to his collaborators that some functions of the company will be eliminated and reduced, although it has not transcended which ones it is.

The numbers do not accompany him either. The coworking company closed the first nine months of the year with losses of 1,250 million dollars (1,135.5 million euros) despite entering 94% more than in the same period of 2018, up to 934 million dollars (848.5 million euros).

But not everything has been bad in 2019 for coworking, but quite the opposite. With the exception of the WeWork stumble, all operators have been growing in the last twelve months. Another of the giants of the shared offices, IWG, has continued to grow this year in Spain, where the company already manages seven Spaces centers and plans to open another six in the coming months of the Spaces brand. In addition, it has 57 spaces under the Regus brand and plans to open the first HQ and No 18 establishments in the country in the coming months.

Impact Hub, Attico and coworking of the socimis

Founded in 2005, Impact Hub is another of the giants of flexible spaces in Europe. The company, based in Vienna (Austria), has 92 centers and eight in development in 81 cities around the world. The company is already present in Spain in locations such as Madrid, Vigo, San Sebastián and Zaragoza.

As patriotic examples are Attico, First and the coworkings of the Merlin and Colonial socimis. Only in 2019, Attico, based in Barcelona, ​​has hired 14,880 new m2 in four operations, has acquired the building that occupied the PDeCAT, with a space of 2,080 m2, as idealista / news, a building in the 22 @ of 6,300 m2 and a space of 5,010 m2 on Josep Tarradellas Avenue.

Thus, the company already has six centers in different areas of Barcelona, ​​with a total area of ​​23,000 m2 for coworking. Among his plans for the future is the intention to disembark in other Spanish cities, with special interest in Madrid.

First Workplaces, formerly known as Busining, will close 2019 with a turnover of six million euros and with 23,600 m2 of open flexible spaces between Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia.

For their part, the Socimis Merlin and Colonial have also risen this year with their coworking businesses. Loom, coworking controlled by the Socimi of Ismael Clemente, has recently opened its first two flexible work centers in Barcelona and plans to make new openings in 2020 and reach 6,000 m2 of surface and a capacity of 600 jobs.

Utopicus, Colonial's coworking arm, has woven in the last year a portfolio of ten centers spread between Barcelona and Madrid, with a total of 21,230 square meters. His plans for the next pass through reaching fifteen centers and 40,800 square meters

Coliving, with a future in Spain but without defined rules

As idealista / news related in a report, coliving is one of the alternative real estate assets that has gained more momentum in recent times. Investors are increasingly interested in looking for different alternatives as long as they find interesting returns and, according to the calculations of the Spanish start-up specialized in coliving Inèdit, the market interest in this new residential modality will skyrocket 40 % over the next year, boosted by the profitability of up to 20% that owners can get thanks to this business.

However, experts remember that currently actualmente coliving "is not subject to clear regulatory rules of play, which is a brake on its definitive takeoff." In fact, they argue that the projects that are being developed in Spain have little to do with large international projects and require a regulatory change to adapt the offer to the new real estate needs of the demand.

For now few are the coliving projects in Spain. One of those who announced their plans for the country in 2019 was Medici, which has joined forces with the German fund Corestate to invest more than one billion euros in the development of its business throughout Europe. In the Spanish market, the company will operate under the Quarters brand and is already negotiating its first coliving project in downtown Barcelona.

This article was written and published in Spanish and has been translated into English via Google Translate. Click here to read the original article.

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