The Storage Group (TSG), an Internet-marketing company serving the self-storage industry, has released an updated version of its move-in platform. ClickandStor 3.0 offers a new interface designed to operate as an e-commerce shopping cart. In addition to allowing storage customers to securely complete the storage move-in process via computer or smartphone, the update allows tenants to purchase moving and packing supplies, tenant insurance, truck rentals and other items, including “food for moving day,” according to a press release. Customers can also read and write reviews through the platform.

Participating self-storage operators don’t need to purchase extra inventory to account for product sales and receive a percentage of sales from the items sold through their facilities each month, the release stated.

TSG has opened the ClickandStor platform to “affiliate vendors” to offer products to self-storage tenants in Asia, Canada and the United States, according to the release.

“Tenants, facilities and vendors will all be able to win with this platform,” said Steve Lucas, chief operating officer.

Based in Maitland, Fla., TSG provides online tools and marketing solutions to the self-storage industry. The company's services include local-listing management, mobile websites, online rentals, pay-per-click advertising, search engine optimization, social media marketing and website development.

Beam Storage Pte. Ltd., a startup business specializing in valet self-storage, has launched in Malaysia and Singapore. The company uses an online platform that allows customers to schedule item pickup, maintain a visual catalog of stored belongings, and schedule delivery of items to their home or business.

Similar to other valet-style storage operators, Beam offers by-the-bin storage targeted at customers who don’t have adequate storage in their home or business. Items are stored in secure warehouses leased by Beam, according to the source. Monthly pricing is S$4 per small box and S$8 per large box. Customers can use their own boxes as long as they meet Beam’s size requirements or purchase boxes through the company, according to its website. Beam will also store oversized items, such as bikes or golf clubs, for S$12 per item per month. The company may refuse to store an item if heavier than 25 kilograms or one person is unable to carry it.

Customers can use the company’s mobile app to manage their belongings. Pickup of items is free, while return deliveries are S$16 regardless of the number of items requested, according to the website. Returns must be scheduled 48 hours in advance. Customer aren’t allowed to visit the storage warehouse.

Since launching last October, Beam has catered to business customers including e-commerce companies, which have taken advantage of flexible space requirements as inventory sells, according to the source. Other commercial customers include accounting and law firms, and event companies.

Beam has a special pricing model for corporate clients, including a flat pickup and delivery fee of S$35. Deliveries for business customers are made within a four-hour window during working hours. Returns marked as urgent outside of normal operating hours are subject to a S$100 fee, according to the website.

Beam currently leases one warehouse in Malaysia and one in Singapore, though it expects to triple its storage space in Singapore in the next six months, the source reported.

CEO Anna Chew believes the company’s leased-warehouse model is beneficial to Beam and its third-party vendors. "It benefits the landlords because they don't have to leave that space empty; it benefits me because I don't have to be locked into a long-term contract at a certain rate," Chew told the source. She intends to enhance Beam’s relationship with its warehousing partners with either “pay-as-you-expand” or profit-sharing models.

As it becomes established, Beam intends to expand service to other Asia-Pacific countries, according to the website. The company is also considering adding a virtual-marketplace to its mobile app through which it could sell unclaimed belongings left by delinquent customers, the source reported.

Beam launched with seed money from venture-capital and individual investors. The company is trying to raise up to S$400,000 in a second round of fundraising on the crowdfunding platform FundedHere, according to the source.

Update 9/7/17 – Hernando Self Storage LLC has opened a new facility in Hernando, Miss. The first phase for the property at 2795 McIngvale Road comprises 41,545 square feet of climate-controlled space in 329 units.

Planters Bank & Trust Co. provided the loan to purchase the property, according to an ASM press release. It’s the firm’s first property under management in the city and ninth in the state. ASM also has construction projects underway in Atlanta and Louisville, Ky.

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6/30/17 – Absolute Storage Management (ASM), a self-storage owner and property-management firm, is building a new facility in Starkville, Miss., with joint-venture partners Jim Burrow, an independent investor, and Billy Orgel, CEO of Tower Ventures, a telecommunications company. Both partners are based in Memphis, Tenn., according to an ASM press release. The facility is expected to open early next year.

The 6-acre property is on Highway 25, near a Super Walmart retail store. Phase one of the project will encompass 65,000 square feet of self-storage and 9,000 square feet of covered vehicle parking.

Financing will be provided by Planters Bank of Mississippi.

In January, ASM purchased two Madison, Ala., facilities in another joint venture with an affiliate of The Natchez Group, a self-storage developer. The sites, Balch Road Self Storage and Madison Boulevard Mini Storage, comprise 83,000 square feet of storage space. ASM plans to upgrade the offices and security systems at each facility, according to a company press release.

Founded in 2002, ASM manages 88 self-storage facilities, 16 of which are owned and operated in joint ventures with the company. Headquartered in Memphis, Tenn., it has regional offices in Atlanta; Charlotte, N.C.; Jackson, Miss.; and Nashville, Tenn.

 

A joint venture between Storage Post Self Storage and VAL 641 NW 12th Avenue LLC, an affiliate of Prudential Variable Contract Real Property Partnership, has acquired a new self-storage facility in Miami for $18.5 million. The seller, Broward Havana LLC, purchased the four parcels in 2015 for approximately $2.6 million, according to the source. Opened approximately two months ago under the management and branding of self-storage real estate investment trust Extra Space Storage, the facility will now operate under the Storage Post name.

The five-story property at 641 N.W. 12th Ave. and 1152 N.W. 7th St. comprises 76,245 square feet of storage space and 2,740 square feet of retail. It’s in the Little Havana community, just three blocks from the Marlins Park baseball stadium and accessible from Florida State Road 836.

Designed by Blistein Design Associates and built by Brickell Group Construction LLC, the project involved the razing of an existing gas station and auto-repair shop. It was financed using an $8.4 million loan from Branch Banking & Trust Co. The retail space leases for $25 per square foot, the source reported.

"We are very happy to acquire this outstanding asset. It is a brand-new facility in a very attractive market with great fundamentals," said Dylan Delaune, chief operating officer for Storage Post. "This top-shelf asset will be another prime property as we continue to grow the Storage Post portfolio in the Miami/Fort Lauderdale market."

Founded in 1998 and based in Atlanta, Storage Post operates 40 facilities in Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, New Jersey and New York.

Prudential Variable is a fund headed by Prudential Financial Inc., a Fortune 500 company whose subsidiaries provide insurance, investment management and other financial products.

Broward Havana LLC is a Sandy Springs, Ga.-based entity controlled by Bruce A. Weiner.

Headquartered in Salt Lake City, Extra Space Storage Inc. is a real estate investment trust that owns or operates 1,470 self-storage properties in 38 states; Washington, D.C.; and Puerto Rico. The company’s properties comprise approximately 1 million units and 111 million square feet of rentable space.

World Insurance Associates LLC, an independent insurance agency, has acquired insurance firm Bruen Deldin DiDio Associates Inc. (BDD) and its subsidiary, Storage Insurance Brokers, a provider of coverages designed specifically for self-storage. BDD Vice President Jeffrey Deldin will join World Insurance as a partner, according to a press release.

“The staff members of BDD bring a wide range of knowledge and experience to our organization. We’re thrilled to welcome Jeffrey Deldin and his team to the World Insurance family,” said Rich Eknoian, co-founder of World Insurance.

“This partnership will allow us to remain on the cutting edge as a leader in the insurance industry, while providing continued and expanded services to our clients,” Deldin added.

Storage Insurance Brokers expects continued national growth under World Insurance. “We are looking forward to offering increased capabilities to the self-storage industry with additional resources and expertise,” said Jessica Lamoureux, program manager.

With a lineage that dates to 1872, BBD services commercial and personal insurance clients in New England, New York and Rhode Island. It employees 35 people at its three offices in Connecticut, New York and Rhode Island. Insurance coverages from Storage Insurance Brokers include wrongful-sale liability, customers’ goods liability, pollutant removal, loss of rental income, employment practices and cyber liability.

Headquartered in Tinton Falls, N.J., World Insurance provides personal and business insurance solutions in 46 states. The company specializes in group benefits and insurance for transportation companies, the hospitality industry, coastal properties and commercial clients in diverse industries. Founded in 2012, it serves more than 23,000 customers from 15 East Coast offices.

A former self-storage manager has been charged with fraudulently collecting nearly $129,000 in workers’ compensation while employed at Brentwood Self Storage in Chesapeake, Va. Winston Lee Wise, 72, made his initial appearance on Sept. 1 in the U.S. District Court in Norfolk, Va. He faces nine felony charges related to accepting the money from February 2003 to May 2015, according to the source.

Wise was employed at the storage facility at 1437 George Washington Highway N. from February 2003 to June 2004 as a contractor, and then as a manager between June 2004 and June 2015. During that time, he earned about $152,000. To conceal the wages, Wise’s checks were addressed to an unidentified woman or a business named “Pamela’s Hauling and Cutting,” according to the indictment.

Wise qualified for total disability after claiming he suffered an unspecified traumatic injury while working in 1987. He began receiving about $685 a week in disability benefits in April 1995. While on disability, Wise was required to report any employment earnings, which he failed to do, the indictment alleges.

If Wise had reported the earnings, the disability benefits would’ve been re-calculated. Wise would’ve collected $261,000 in benefits between 2003 and 2015, instead of the $390,000 he received.

Opened in 1981, Brentwood Self Storage is owned by Brentwood Development Inc., a family-owned corporation.

By Warren Dazzio

Though it’s still early in the process and talking heads on both sides of the political aisle will continue to debate President Trump’s proposed tax changes, amid all the media speculation, no one is talking about what taxpayers should be doing in advance of coming changes. Smart advisers are telling clients to maximize tax deductions in 2017 because they’ll be worth less if the plan goes into effect and tax rates go down. Their strategy is to maximize deductions at higher rates and take lower tax rates in the future.

Like most building owners, self-storage owners like to expense everything. Unfortunately, the proposed tax codes set the stage to change that.

The newly revised Tangible Property Regulations of the U.S. Tax Code were designed to give guidance on what owners are required to capitalize and what they can expense. They have major economic benefits for owners of any type of building, especially self-storage. At the same time, they create compliance issues to which you should pay close attention. A reputable cost-segregation company teamed with a well-informed CPA can make this easy for you. In addition, here are several tax solutions to help you maximize deductions, lower income taxes and create additional cash flow.

Straight-Line Depreciation vs. Cost Segregation

The U.S. tax code allows building owners to depreciate their property in two ways. Straight-line depreciation slowly depreciates the whole building over 39 years. In this scenario, the tax code basically allows you to offset income by 1/39th of the cost of the building every year for 39 years. Cost segregation breaks a building into parts and accelerates their depreciation into shorter tax lives—most commonly five, seven and 15 years. This creates a large amount of depreciation in the first five years of building ownership that offsets business revenue, resulting in reduced income taxes.

A cost-segregation study generates tax savings to the tune of $30,000 to $80,000 in additional cash flow per $1 million in building cost. Owners can maximize deductions at the higher tax rates and use the additional savings and time value of money to gain interest and invest back into their business.

Other Deductions

Cost segregation is also the basis for allowing owners to capture other deductions. In the case of new construction or additions, a cost-segregation study will identify items that qualify for Section 179 and bonus depreciation, allowing for a significant amount of extra depreciation. Bonus depreciation on new construction allows the owner to capture an additional 50 percent on shorter class lives for 2017. This will reduce in 2018 and 2019 and eventually phase out.

Self-storage owners can particularly benefit from cost segregation and bonus depreciation because items like interior doors, moveable wall partitions, security systems, specialty lighting, landscaping and paving can all be accelerated. Did you renovate or remodel this year? A partial asset disposition (PAD) allows you to write down the basis of assets that were removed as well as the labor costs to eliminate and dispose of those items.

Typically, owners capitalize the entire renovation when some portion of the project can be expensed. You can receive a tax deduction in the same tax year as the renovation, but it’s a “use it or lose it” opportunity. If you fail to capture a PAD in the current tax year, the chance for the write-down is lost permanently.

Improvement vs. Repair

Lastly, an engineering-based cost-segregation study will identify and value building systems and structural components. The tax codes give very specific guidelines on whether expenditures should be capitalized as an “improvement” or expensed as a “repair.” A building-systems definition is the basis for maximizing those expensed deductions. The new regulations also allow building owners to “look back” and expense large deductions in the current year by applying the regulations to prior years. Best of all, none of these strategies require an amended return.

A reputable cost-segregation firm will perform a site visit of each building, back up its work with proper documentation, and defend the work at no cost to the client should an audit ever occur. These firms work closely with your CPA or tax preparer to maximize deductions, while helping to maintain tax-code compliance.

Well-informed building owners (including President Trump) have used these tax strategies for years. Take advantage of them. Maximize deductions now and take the lower tax rates in the future. It’s the best of both worlds.

Warren Dazzio is executive vice president of Cost Segregation Services Inc., a provider of engineering-based repair regulations based on U.S. tax code, as well as cost-segregation and R&D studies in the United States. He has extensive knowledge of operations, sales and business development in multiple industries. For more information, call 225.367.1154, e-mail dazziow@costsegserve.com; visit www.cssistudy.com.

A proposal to convert a former bowling alley to self-storage in South Milwaukee, Wis., received little interest from the city planning commission during a preliminary meeting last month. Brian Fisher, business development manager for development company Anderson Ashton, presented plans on Aug. 28 for a "state-of-the-art, climate-controlled” facility for the 7-acre property at 305 N. Chicago Ave. The site formerly housed AMF South Park Lanes, which closed in 2014, according to the source.

The development would include converting the building’s interior to storage as well as constructing new buildings around the main structure. The facility would contain 500 to 600 units.

Because the meeting was a pre-application submittal for the conditional-use process, no action was taken, the source reported. A formal proposal has yet to be submitted.

Mayor Erik Brooks called the parcel a “most intriguing site” and said he’d prefer to keep within the city’s comprehensive plan, which calls for residential use. "I have a hard time going away from that plan," said Brooks, who admitted a residential development would be challenging for the 40,000-square-foot, 40-lane bowling alley. "I just don't want to settle. It's not easy to market, but that doesn't mean we should give up."

The parcel’s zoning is split between commercial and residential, with most of it falling under the Historic Grant Park Neighborhood, according to city engineer Kyle Vandercar. "A single-family development will be challenging, at best," he said.

One point in favor of the storage project would be the city’s ability to collect millions in tax dollars, alderman R. Patrick Stoner noted during the meeting. Alderman Craig Maass, who’s not a commission member but attended the meeting, said the city needs to “give the neighborhood more time” to find a suitable development for the property.

Following nearly an hour of discussion, Vandercar said the commission wasn’t interested in seeing a formal application for the storage project. No one objected.

It’s not the first time the city has discussed self-storage for the property, the source reported. Other uses, including multi-family housing and a banquet facility, have also been considered.

Based in New Berlin, Wis., Anderson Ashton is a design/build general contractor for commercial, industrial and institutional industries.

A new self-storage facility has opened in Buford, Ga. Developed at 3220 Sardis Church Road, Premier Storage at Hamilton Mill is the third property owned by Ken and Kelly Gary. It will be managed by Absolute Storage Management Inc., a self-storage owner and property-management firm, according to a press release.

Property features include 24-hour access, climate control, gated access and video cameras. The facility accepts package deliveries on behalf of its customers, and contains a retail store that sells moving and packing supplies. Customers also have access to online billpay and tenant insurance.

Founded in 2002, ASM manages 88 self-storage facilities, 16 of which are owned and operated in joint ventures with the company. Headquartered in Memphis, Tenn., it has regional offices in Atlanta; Charlotte, N.C.; Jackson, Miss.; and Nashville, Tenn.

 

OpenTech Alliance Inc., a Phoenix-based provider of self-storage kiosks, call-center services and other technology, has developed an Internet of Everything (IoE) platform-enabled access-control system that will be the first of a next-generation group of products designed for IoE, an open-architecture-based platform that allows vendors to develop their own technology integrations. The centralized, intelligent access solution will be called INSOMNIAC CIA and available in February, according to a press release.

The cloud-based access-control system is designed specifically for self-storage and can be used without a PC at a facility. “The system gives operators total control of one to thousands of facilities with a mobile-friendly administration portal using any Internet-connected device, including PC, Mac, tablets or smartphones,” the release stated. “The portal provides secure, real-time diagnostics, data visualization and reporting insights into what is happening at a facility at all times, from anywhere in the world.”

“The product was designed to address the largest pain points self-storage operators have with existing solutions, including reliance on old-school PC technology, skyrocketing pricing, lack of centralized data and control, limited technical support, and no long-term hardware warranty,” said Jon Loftin, vice president, who’s leading the IoE project. “We know the industry is anxious to move off their old technology, so we are offering customers the ability to pre-order their systems with a 100 percent refundable deposit.”

INSOMNIAC CIA will include a hardware warranty, software subscription, unlimited telephone support and the Storage Genie mobile app, which offers a “no touch” feature that allows tenants to access a self-storage facility without having to punch in a keypad code or pull out their smartphones, according to the release. OpenTech also plans to integrate its IoE system with its LiveAgent! call-center application.

“We are very lucky to have Jon leading our IoE platform effort,” said Robert A. Chiti, president. “He has over 25 years of experience in the access and control arena, and it is his experience and leadership that have made it possible for OpenTech to deliver such a dramatically advanced solution. We are all excited to see what he comes up with next.”

OpenTech provides several models of INSOMNIAC self-serve kiosks as well as a range of self-storage rental solutions including the INSOMNIAC Live! Call Center, INSOMNIAC Online Web and mobile applications, LiveAgent! software products, and the INSOMNIAC ILock Security System, all available through the company's self-storage cloud.