finding/buying/building... recording-as-a-business advice?

[solo-bration]

hi guys,
I've been reading the threads about finding and building spaces and they've been helpful. I'm hoping some of you might be able to lend even more info from your own experiences with actually finding/buying/opening a studio? I'm in my late 20's now. I don't own any property yet, so I have a limited knowledge of the business order-of-things when it comes to finding a location, leasing/buying it, bank loans (basically starting a business), etc.

I would like to partner with a friend of mine and open a small studio. Together we have stock-piled some decent gear. I rent 1/2 of a 2-family house now, so recording drums are not an option for me there and that is obviously a necessity.

Aside from lots of money, maybe you can tell me what I'd need, where to find it, and in what order to attempt trying to make something like this a reality. Any tips/advice is much appreciated.

[TapeOpLarry]

Realize that more time will now be spent doing business things than recording.
Realize that partnerships usually blow up in your face.
Realize that there is no money to be made.
Realize that if you don't have a line of people waiting to record with you right now they won't magically appear tomorrow.
Realize that all the soundproofing in the world still might not make the neighbors happy.
Estimate time and money and triple it.
If in doubt, hire a pro.*

Number one: Make sure this is what you have to do. this way I won't be buying all your gear off you in five years, while you give me some sob story about how it didn't work out, and ask my why I'm so "lucky".

It ain't luck, that's for sure.
LC



*Professionals I hire/pay on a regular basis:
Bookkeeping/CPA (this changed my life)
Tech (not often but "yes" for the hard shit)
Cable makers (I wish I'd had Redco make all my shit)
Piano Tuner



Hamptone hired for the new place:
Architect, Contractor, painters, flooring, plumbing, electrical, roofers, door/window people, etc.

I hired:
Piano Mover
Carpenter
Painter
Drywall Mudder

[mwingerski]

If you love engineering, you might be better served just finding a partnership with an established studio nearby and setting up an arrangement where you leave some gear there in exchange for a favorable day rate.

Building a space is a huge undertaking / commitment and chances are that there are places around that could use the extra work...

Also, make sure you partner is either like a brother and you guys can talk about EVERYTHING (including how you would dissolve the partnership in the event that some body gets tired of it) and have a very solidly drafted partnership agreement done by an attorney.

The nuts and bolts of constructing the studio are nothing compared to the headaches that can arise when partnerships become difficult, business coming in isn't paying off all the bills, neighbors threaten the viability of your studio and so forth...

[solo-bration]

Thanks for the insight guys. Lots of truth. The partner thing has been a weighty issue in my head. I guess it'd be safer for me to make a studio 100% mine (legally) and just work out a situation where I make it available to the friend of mine for his sessions - rather than partner. I'm currently doing some sessions (drums) at a friends studio and everything else (overdubs) at my home studio. I'd just really like to be able to do it all in my own place (haha, who wouldn't?). I'd save myself money (day rate rental) too, obviously... However, I'm sure I'd have a million new headaches and loads of owner's stress - understandably.

Although limited, I think I have a pretty realistic sense of the business. I know I'd be starting small and don't expect any more work than I currently create for myself. I appreciate you pointing out what you have though. It's a lot to consider. Maybe I'll just need to work freelance in existing studios until I own a single family home someday (and can talk my lady into letting me gut a floor), or stumble into some other unlikely amazing situation.

[mwingerski]

Thinking it's unlikely (usually) = making it unlikely.

However, you may think you'd be saving yourself some money in getting a space of your own, but once you add up the cost of materials, construction loans, legal fees, Electrical, HVAC, Liability insurance, new tax considerations (could be better, could be worse), additional stress and anxiety of having a higher operating cost, etc... you may find it's still cheaper to rent out studios when you need it...

Or just get a very small room and then go out to other studios when you need to track drums or things that don't work in your small space...

[solo-bration]

Thinking it's unlikely (usually) = making it unlikely

haha sorry, pretty jaded guy sometimes... but I make things happen.

[drumsound]

Everything in this thread is true. Owning a business is tough, Partnering is even tougher!

[TapeOpLarry]

I made Jackpot! all mine and worked out a deal with Elliott Smith wher ehe could bring gear in and help build the space and get a minimal day rate. We never even implemented it, as he was on tour and moved and didn't use the space enough to bother me! Plus he turned out to be a good person to know and a great guy.

If I was starting fresh I'd look for places I could use for main tracking, or have a mobile setup for that where I could go to the band's houses or shit. Then have a small studio for overdubs and mixing. So much less ovehead and problems.

If you're starting small you will be paid small, and that's the place where income won't equal the money going out. I know, been there...

[mwingerski]

It seems as though the large tracking room studio business is about in the same boat as the large record label business. They both fill a need in the marketplace, but the economics of it all means that there will be fewer of them.I think the recording business is headed in the direction of producer engineers with smaller mix / overdub rooms who then rent out larger rooms when they are occasionally needed.

For me and a lot of other engineers i know, so much more time is spent on mixing / overdubs / editing than on tracking that you usually don't need a really big space. I can track vocals, acoustic guitars, keyboards, horns and strings at my home studio, then go into a larger room when needed for drums, electric guitars and piano, or for a full band playing live (which is usually what happens when drums are involved)

The overhead for a studio can be thousands of dollars a month for a relatively small space. And that's before the engineer even gets paid...

I agree with Larry about the mobile idea too... I think that one of the more exciting developments of the last 10 years is the ability to move a fully functional studio around to wherever you want to work. It used to be you needed a truck to do a good recording outside of a studio. Now you can fit a 48 channel recording rig into a 2 door honda

[TapeOpLarry]

Or tear up the interior!

[BusyBoxSt7]

For anyone located NOT on the coasts (or otherwise expensive areas):

In some areas, like the south, while the costs of renting someone else's studio seem the same or sometimes higher (due to a lower number of good live rooms), the real estate is WAY cheaper so the equation rent v. own is different.

I'm looking at a house w/ an 18x30' room w/ a 12' vaulted ceiling that has VERY little bleed and the neighbors are far away anyway (less crowded city). It's a short drive from downtown. It's also got a 2 car garage ready to be converted into a control or iso booths if needed. Monthly "rent" for me= $450+utilities. Granted I'll still have regular acoustics/wiring/CPA etc costs... Then again, living in your studio to combine personal/studio cost is a whole other discussion, haha.

solo-bration:
one thing to consider is location v. ideal room. Location priority= downtown and spend a ton on soundproofing and maybe dealing w/ a low ceiling. Room priority= maybe a bit further out but no neighbor troubles and might be easier to find a place you'll have to alter less to get it sounding how you want.

[Jeff White]

If I was starting fresh I'd look for places I could use for main tracking, or have a mobile setup for that where I could go to the band's houses or shit. Then have a small studio for overdubs and mixing. So much less ovehead and problems.

I am buying a house in Philly with a third bedroom and a usable basement. I will treat the third bedroom or basement enough to be a control room, build some kind of iso booth for vocals and acoustic instruments (or just gobos), and use the office space / warehouse space the my day job occupies (my brother is part owner) on the weekends for my own personal and/or close friends' drum tracks, loud amps, etc. All other recordings will have the basic tracks done at the band's rehearsal space, with vox and acoustics done at my house, or the band will pay to have me engineer drums in a real room as a freelance engineer. I have a home setup as well as a remote setup for this purpose. I'll also use the home control room environment for ADR work for film and whatever else I can do there (I have paying gigs right now and on the horizon). I don't rely on audio as my principle income, but I am at the point that the audio work that I do now is equal to 1/8 to 1/4 of my full-time income and growing each year.

In the ever unstable world of recording, I would rather work on music that I love to be involved with than attempt to pay my bills every month by killing myself recording music that I don't like for $10-20/hr. ADR and film work pays me $45/hr, friends bands pay me what they can afford or pay me in gear that I can't afford, and I have a creative day-gig that I love. I'm much happier this way.

Jeff

[BusyBoxSt7]

Brings up an interesting point. Recording income also varies by area. Vague rule of thumb: The more studios you cram into a city, the less they charge (excepting the mega studios that charge per fancy). Ex: Austin has a plethora of $25/hr. studios, some of which are great. Dallas has some $50/hr. studios that are awful.

I'm looking at running 1/2 my income off live sound (easy/ stress free by comparison) and 1/2 from recording so that I can be a tiny bit pickier about clients. Hopefully later will lose the live sound but until then, as Ipress said, it can get pretty lame recording people you'd rather not.

[signorMars]

you may find, considering the above mentioned price issue, that you can get a lot of work by not being a greedy jerk. san antonio is full of $75/hr studios literally operating off a 12 channel Mackie and a single ADAT, so when I present potential clients with a reasonable rate (more on par with Austin, which is where I started, back before marriage moved me to san antonio), they usually jump on it. unfortunately, there is almost no follow through with most bands in San Antonio, so this is really an academic point, but still... also... Dallas is getting nailed by the real estate slump. i bet you could snatch up some nice forclosure property for cheap! just be prepared to find feces in the refrigerator.

[bannerj]

I know this thread is a few months old, but I couldn't resist. I wonder what this guy ended up doing? Sorry this post is so long! It's just my 2 cents.

In a TapeOp a while ago there was a great interview with the guy from Earlimart and he had a great setup. His space was a storefront and he shared rent with a band or a few bands (can't remember) who also used the space for rehearsal.

I'm also concerned that when Larry and others initially jumped in with all the initial building costs. There are a lot of people who make great records in very shitty spaces (as so many on here know). Yes, you will want to treat the room for monitoring purposes, yes you'll spend more than you could imagine on cables and stands and the un-sexy stuff that no one thinks about when looking at $1000/channel mic pres and whatnot.

The biggest thing that Larry said that is most important is that if you don't already have people wanting to record with you now, then you won't necessarily have anyone who will be interested once you've got a space...maybe, but it's a big gamble.

The most important reason why anybody would want to begin recording is because they are around people who need to be recorded. Maybe this is a stretch...but it's like a guy in Illinois who wants to deep sea fish. You got to be around a music scene. That is why the Earlimart setup makes so much sense. It is an example of a group of people who weren't making a ton of money who needed to share resources. It doesn't have to be an official business partnership for the sake of making a ton of money...its is about some artists who are desperate to make music. I wonder if alot of what makes partnerships fail is when they are built around unrealistic financial expectations?

Maybe we can think of sharing a studio space like we think about keeping a band together. What keeps bands together?

1. the players are loyal friends and love any excuse to be together
2. there is a deep commitment to the music that is being made and an awareness that that kind of music can't be made in any other way without that combination of people.
3. by some miracle they have found a way to make a living at it
4. it usually comes down to some combination of 1-3, but mostly 1 & 2 keep things floating.

Very few of us make it to #3 and if they do it often wrecks #'s 1 & 2. So I say for the love of GOD! Stick as close to 1 & 2 as you possibly can! I've got a "real" job for just that reason--to protect 1 & 2.

Oh, and Fletcher wrote out a great method on studio rates in some thread for me some where on here. The idea is you expand your studio at a steady pace based on your growing client list.