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Comment by untog | Hacker News Reader

What you describe really isn't very typical of the kind of people WeWork rents space to.

Choosing a different location each day based on whim and availability is all very well for a solo freelancer, but once you scale that up to as many as two people you're going to start having problems finding space and private places where you can talk, call clients, etc. etc. Once you start getting to 3 or 4 people, forget about it. And what about people who want dedicated hardware - a keyboard, monitor, etc?

WeWork has a valuable proposition for those groups. Rent out a small office while you're in the early stage, have everyone in a room with breakout meeting rooms and phone booths available just outside. A kitchen where you can get a coffee, prepare food, etc. etc.

I still think WeWork is an insane proposition because they cost a lot and they're not that great, but let's not pretend they offer nothing over a local coffee shop.

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My WeWork experience, at one of the WeWork's on Mission St., on a floor with office space rather than desk-sharers, is phone booths continuously taken up by tech-bros hogging the quiet space, lots of noise in the common spaces,and a building (not wework) security guard who took a dislike to me and made sure I knew it on a regular basis.

Meh, it was fine for what it was I guess, but I think the company I was working for left wework not long after I left the company.

> phone booths continuously taken up by tech-bros hogging the quiet space

Truth

All true, but my local coffeeshop has a meeting room you can rent out (or, if you buy $20/hour in drinks, it's free, just reserve it). I have no idea how often it's rented out, but it's certainly used at least occasionally. I think a lot of coffeeshops could do that, depending on their layout (this place has one room that's on the other side of the register from the rest of the shop, so it works well). No idea how that compares to WeWork in regards to price. I'm solo, so I just sit at a table.

What about the tax advantage? I'm not convinced that the co-working spaces are worth their cost, but I assume it's a lot easier to write off a co-working space over a coffee shop order.

You can write off absolutely anything. The problem comes if the irs decides to challenge it. But I think with good documentation you could make a good case for your coffee purchases being your office rent expense. You would need to exclude the portion that you would have bought anyway (for example if you have always bought two coffees a day, then you can't start claiming that 2 coffees a day is part of your office rent expense.)

Once you start getting to 3 or 4 people, forget about it

It can be done, remote teams much larger than that work all day every day without using their voices with each other, just Slack or git messages or whatever.

What if the money WW is burning through went to libraries to build more workspaces and conference rooms?

I think WeWork's current setup provides meeting rooms and some temporary dedicated space for companies of 4-10 people, but the environment is not very conducive for productivity. Typically, they're loud, too cramped, and with have lots of distractions.

Where are you located? Because here in Stockholm they charge about market rate. I looked at some of their competitors and most were more expensive.

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