Howdy.
We’ve been quiet lately, but that’s because we’ve had a little surprise brewing.
We got a building for our makerspace! It’s right across the street from the main engineering building and next door to one of the most popular establishments in all of BCS ( Bryan/College Station) named Hurricane Harry’s.
Calling my friends about this often leads to a really funny exchange.
~Shakespeare time~
__epic phone ringing sounds__
Cast:
Braxton - homie
Ismail - Cowboy King of Starforge
Braxton: Hey Ismail what’s up?
Ismail: You know Hurricane Harry’s?
Braxton: Yep, what about it.
Ismail: The suite next door has a new owner.
Braxton: What do you mean? Starforge? No way.
Ismail: Yep. We rented it.
maniacal laughter on both ends, Shakespeare returns to his grave.
Let me explain why this place was special. Google maps to the rescue.
7 minute walk. In reality it’s slightly shorter, and it’s a 2-3 minute thing with a bike or skateboard ( I don’t have better info on walking, I refuse to be a pedestrian). Either way, we physically could not get any closer. Most of that empty space is parking lot really.
Now, how much did we pay for this place? Must have been a lot, as it was very much prime real estate.
Nope. $1/sq. ft / month. =>
$1920 / month with first month free so we can pay for renovations.
There’s a few caveats, very small ones though. Biggest of which was actually something that works in our favor and is that the term of the lease is 6 months because the owners want to at some point, tear the whole property down and build a new high rise on it’s place. The thing is though, I talked to one of our neighbors and he said that they’ve been saying that for 15 years. Looking at the economy and how interest rates have risen, they clearly missed their golden opportunity to finance and execute such a big project and so they will most likely not do it anytime soon. Should they choose to do so that is fine, we have at the very minimum 6 months, but both me and the neighbors are highly skeptical that they will. No concrete plans have been presented anyways.
The other caveat was that we had to do a bit of repair work which mostly boils down to ripping out the linoleum floor.
Holy guacamole, that was tough. Took like 14 hours of work to get it off, with multiple shifts averaging 3 dudes. The first half of the floor came up real easy, but the second one was just straight up hell on earth because there were two layers of flooring underneath the linoleum and we spent most of the time separating the linoleum from the top layer, which was chipping away only inches at a time. So we spent 3 ish hours fiddling with that, then right before dinner I somehow broke through to the layer underneath it and it came up really easily, to the point where, 2 hours later, we finished the whole thing.
That’s definitely up there with most physically demanding things I’ve ever done for sure. But now we’re basically 99% done, and we cleared out most of the rubble ( using a janky DIY wheelbarrow made from a plastic tub and a dolly).
Once that was done we spent about a day cleaning up the rubble and took care of the trash issues caused by our construction debris.
There’s a lot of little things that are different about commercial real estate vs residential real estate. A lot more negotiating with the city and the other business owners. Like in residences, you really don’t care too much what your neighbors think about you, but for the most part, you care a heck of a lot more when it comes to commercial neighbors.
Anyways, my time is limited. I’d love to write more, but there’s something else I’d rather write. Inspiration is odd. Besides, we’re still progressing rapidly.
I’ll spare you pictures, and go for a video instead:
Before:
After:
Ismail