Pity the building managers and construction companies...not to mention commercial real estate agents and REIT investors. The pandemic has convinced businesses and employees that a lot of the things that can be done at the office are better done remotely. 

In fact, 9 in 10 workers never want to work in an office full-time again, says Chris Herd founder and CEO of Firstbase.

"The office will kill any company that goes back full-time," he insists. "Companies who adopted eCommerce 10 years ago replaced every company who didn't."

Not convinced? Here are some more stats courtesy of Firstbase:

• 5 in 10 workers want to work remotely full-time going forward;
• 8 in 10 companies plan to hire more remotely going forward;
• $1 trillion cut in office spend if WFH 50%/week in the US alone;


According to Herd, companies that adopt remote working will replace every company that doesn't for two simple reasons—cost and talent. 

"Office-first companies won’t be able to compete with remote-first companies in terms of efficiency, both economic and operationally," explained Herd. "Not only will remote-first companies increase their average level of talent with each hire, they will be far more cost-efficient. City living is subsidized by companies, leading to a lower disposable and quality of life."

Herd says office-first companies spend $18,400 on average, a workplace, a person; in contrast, high-end remote setups cost $2,000 a year. As a result, remote is $16,400 less a year, for each employee, or a $16.4 million saving for 1,000 workers.

Just as important, the most talented people are stipulating remote work as a condition of employment.

"Companies who don’t provide this won’t be able to attract the best people," says Herd. "Companies who don’t give this to their existing workers will lose their most talented people to their biggest competitors."