IPMS Interview with Neil Shah

GlobeSt.com recently conducted an interview with Neil Shah, New York City-based managing director of the Americas at RICS, part of the International Property Management Standards Coalition, exploring the benefits of the international property measurement standard (IPMS). The IPMS is a standardized and globally applicable method for measuring property developed by the IPMS Coalition, a group of 52 professional and not-for-profit organizations from around the world working together on the development and implementation of these standards. An excerpt from the interview follows:

GlobeSt.com: How will IPMS take global effect? How will it impact investment in the US?

Shah: The Coalition plans to launch The International Property Measurement Standard (IPMS) for offices this year, after being drafted by an independent standards committee and following significant global consultation. The Coalition has been discussing the initiative with stakeholders around the world and some early adopters include the Dubai government, Vodafone and the International Monetary Fund. Coalition members in North America, such as Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA), CoreNet and the Institute for Real Estate Management, will continue to roll out the standard to the market.

We believe that demand will continue to be driven over time through a growing awareness of the benefits that IPMS offers in providing comparable information from one market to the next. Initially it will particularly impact investors in the United States with portfolios over more than one market who want the comparables, or foreign investors into North America who are already using IPMS across the markets—real estate service providers will need to be comfortable with the operation of the standards.

GlobeSt.com: How will these standards address inconsistencies in property measurement?

Shah: The office standards apply common principles across space measurement and allow full disclosure of the property's actual size. So depending on the market you are in, lifts, stairs, columns, car parking spaces, floors not actually present, may all be included in the measurement of the usable office space. This means that currently if an occupier is looking for office space for 100 staff members in another market, these unanticipated differences in measurement might result in a capacity of just 76 staff. Using IPMS and its consistent approach will alleviate this problem.

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