For years I've been operating my studio out of a 200sf outbuilding attached to my house, I have edit space and a couple client chairs - it's quaint but it works. We are slowly outgrowing this, and I'm considering renting a small commercial space to move into.

I'm in So Cal (San Diego) and there are a couple of studios in town, most aren't well equipped for broadcast, and the ones that are cost ~$1k/day to rent.

I was originally looking for about 1k sqft for the office, a reception area, a meeting room, etc. There is some commercial/light industrial space around here for ~$1/sqft/mo, and I'm considering getting more like 2k sqft, putting the office in the front of one of these spaces, and putting a studio in the back (with a rollup bay door), putting a hard cyc on either side (one white, one green) plus a black curtain, pre lighting the hard cyc, and renting studio space for perhaps slightly less than other places around here are doing it for. I figure I would only have to do 1-2 rentals a month to make it worthwhile.

I don't have any experience with this, and I can't reach out to my local guys, because I would basically be their competition.

Any words of wisdom?

A DOLLAR A SQUARE FOOT A MONTH?!?!?!?!?! (Yes, yelling intended...)

Wow... that is CHEAP by commercial real estate standards up here on the West Coast of Canada.

I know that doesn't answer your question but with a well thought out business plan, at least your burn rate is quite reasonable.