In the wake of a steady shift away from traditional brick-and-mortar business to the online, e-commerce space, empty buildings and vacant plots of land are becoming a rather common site these days. If you’ve ever walked into a once-vibrant shopping complex or mall, or you’ve walked down a rather eerily sparsely occupied outdoor market, you’ve probably wondered whether or not such vacancies have some opportunity for you – if you’re an entrepreneur at heart, that is. Empty buildings do indeed present a good window of opportunity to the true entrepreneur at heart because you can make use of that setup without much start-up capital.
Find Out Who the Owner Is
You’ll be surprised to learn that some buildings stand empty for very long periods of time, so too plots of land on which very little development has happened, if there’s been any development at all. Chances are there’s always a plan for those empty buildings and vacant plots of land, but as with every other area of life and business, things seldom go according to plan. You’d perhaps be shocked to learn of empty buildings and vacant plots of land lying in limbo for up to 20 years and more. In this particular scenario it would naturally prove to be quite a challenge to find out exactly who owns those assets, particularly if you’re looking for an owner who has some sort of control over the immediate precedence of that asset. Are any business proceedings halted as a result of there being a backlog of unpaid taxes, for instance? Is it perhaps a building or piece of land which was inherited by a few beneficiaries whose varied plans for the property have halted any form of development?
Once you’ve found out who the owner is though, you can start to think about negotiating terms for the operation of a business venture.
Types of Business Ideas to Entertain
In the case of vacant land you’d naturally need a fair amount of start-up capital to perhaps develop the land into a profitable business, of which the profits you could share with the owner or pay the property off so that you can ultimately assume its full ownership. But what about a vacant plot of land which is assessed not to be suitable for any form of traditional development, like one which is perhaps so far away from any town that just about any form of business activity would not be profitable? This is when the mind of a true entrepreneur looks towards business opportunities such as perhaps producing organic compost and then transporting the produce as it’s ordered.
Aside from the transportation costs, the associated overheads to operate such a business are very low, but there’s definitely a market for the product.
The same goes for empty buildings. A few high quality heavy duty trolleys along with some good shelving makes for a great warehousing or storage facility and a service which can be sold to a number of different companies, individuals, etc. I mean even e-commerce sites have to store their inventory somewhere, right?