Good office move and fit-out planning is the difference between a smooth transition and weeks of chaos for your team. Move an SME office badly and you lose productivity, frustrate staff and risk an ugly surprise on your old lease. Plan it well and most of your people barely notice the disruption. The good news is that a calm move is almost entirely down to preparation — knowing what to do, in what order, and starting early enough. This guide walks London SME occupiers through how to plan an office move and fit-out without grinding work to a halt.
Start with the lease, not the layout
It is tempting to dive straight into floor plans and paint colours, but the smart first move is to read both leases carefully — the one you are leaving and the one you are taking. Your outgoing lease will set out your dilapidations and reinstatement obligations: the state you must return the old space in, which can mean stripping out partitions, making good and redecorating. Your incoming lease will tell you what you are allowed to change and whether you need a licence to alter from the new landlord. Sorting these two things early stops them derailing you later — and lets you budget for the cost of the space you are leaving, not just the one you are moving into.
How far ahead should you plan an office move and fit-out?
For a typical SME office, start planning three to six months before you want to move in. That sounds generous, but the timeline fills quickly: you need time to design and price the new space, secure landlord consents on both ends, build the fit-out and organise the physical move. Leave it too late and you end up paying rent on two spaces for longer than you need, or rushing the fit-out and paying a premium for it. If a lease break or expiry is driving the move, work backwards from that date and build in a buffer.
Build a phased plan
Breaking the move into phases keeps it manageable. A simple sequence looks like this:
- Confirm the new space, agree heads of terms and check the lease conditions.
- Design and space-plan the new office around how your team actually works.
- Get an itemised fit-out quote and secure landlord consent (licence to alter).
- Carry out the fit-out while you keep operating from your current office.
- Move over — ideally in one clean weekend switchover — then handle the strip-out and dilapidations on the old space.
Running the fit-out on the new space while you stay put in the old one is the single biggest thing you can do to protect your team from disruption. It costs a little more in overlapping rent, but it means your people move into a finished office rather than a building site.
How do you keep the team working during a move?
Disruption comes from surprises, so communicate early and often. A few practical steps go a long way:
- Give staff a clear timeline and a single point of contact for questions.
- Move over a weekend or in stages so nobody loses a working day.
- Sort IT and connectivity first — a desk with no internet is a desk that cannot work.
- Let people pack their own personal items, but use professional movers for the heavy lifting.
- Keep a small team on hand on day one to deal with the inevitable snags.
Don’t forget the space you’re leaving
The office you are moving out of can be the most expensive part of the whole exercise if you ignore it. Under most leases you are liable for dilapidations — putting the space back to an agreed condition. That can mean removing the fit-out you or a previous tenant installed, repairing wear and tear and redecorating. Budget for it, get advice on your reinstatement obligations before you hand back the keys, and factor the strip-out into your move timeline. A contractor who understands the commercial side can often handle your new fit-out and your old dilapidations together, which is cheaper and far less stressful than juggling two firms.
Who should you involve, and when?
Bring your fit-out contractor in early — ideally before you have signed the new lease — so they can sanity-check the space, flag any structural or services issues and give you a realistic budget and programme. Involve your IT provider, your office manager and a representative from each team so the design reflects how people really work. The earlier these voices are in the room, the fewer expensive changes you make later.
What should you budget to plan for?
A move-and-fit-out budget has more moving parts than a straight fit-out, so plan for each of them. The fit-out itself is the biggest line — indicatively £40–65 per sq ft for a basic scheme, £65–120 for mid-range and £150-plus for high-spec, all ranges to plan around rather than firm quotes. On top of that, budget for the physical move and professional movers, new or reconfigured IT and connectivity, any overlapping rent while you fit out the new space, and — the one people forget — the dilapidations and strip-out on the office you are leaving. Setting money aside for the old space from day one is what stops the final bill coming as a shock.
