Wednesday, April 30, 2008

The Cost of a Vacant Building

We all have vacant buildings in our downtowns. They are often unsightly and give the impression of a downtrodden business district. Unfortunately, the costs are actually much bigger than that.

According to a hypthetical study by Donovan Rypkema, the costs of a vacancy towards a local economy are staggering:

> $200,000 in direct retail sales
> $112,500 in secondary retail sales
> $24,000 in salaries
> $10,000 in rents
> $1,050 in property taxes
> $8,960 in business profits
> $7,600 in bank deposits
> $5,000 in utility collections
> $3,200 in advertising revenues

This analysis was conducted some time ago, so the numbers have probably increased because of inflation since then.

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