This week iconic British airline BA announced that they were looking into selling the company's headquarters, as the airline expects meaningful homeworking to stick around in the future.
Presumably such a sale would raise a reasonable amount of cash at a time when the company could really use it — British Airways, like pretty much every other airline in the world, did not have a good 2020. Its revenues plummeted by more than £9.3bn (almost $13bn) last year, a fall of more than 70%, and the company had to cut more than 10,000 jobs.
Chuck it on the market
Selling an office space of this magnitude is a little different to selling a house. The British Airways office is 97,000 square feet of space — and (no surprises) it's near an airport. Maybe another airline will snap it up, maybe not, but the BA announcement raises a bigger question for all businesses or commercial real estate owners to consider: if we downsize, how easy will it be to find a buyer or occupant for our old office space? The more specialized that space, the harder it's going to be.
