The search for the perfect balance between working from home and going to the office is a topic of discussion among leaders, including those in the real estate industry. It's in the news everywhere, with large companies and governments calling for employees to return to the office, such as the Biden administration in the US and Lyft, which recently laid off employees and then asked for those still working for the company to return to the office. In Brazil, tensions between employees, companies, and governments are also high, as seen when the CNJ asked judges to stop working from home.

But is there a middle ground? For Tiago Alves, CEO of IWG in Brazil, the company that owns the Regus and Spaces brands of flexible workspaces and coworking, there is a better option for all parties involved: flexible and hybrid working model, offered by coworking spaces.

What Tiago Alves says about coworking workplaces can already be seen in the real estate market. All across Latin America, there is a shift towards flexible office spaces, with coworking  now ranking seventh among the largest occupiers of high-standard office space in Brazil's main cities. According to the SiiLA Market Analytics platform, the sector has surpassed other giant sectors of the economy, such as healthcare and food.

In just two years, the coworking sector has jumped from not even being among the top 15 occupiers to occupying over 207,000 square meters of A+ and A corporate floors in the main cities covered by SiiLA in Brazil.

Tiago Alves attributes this growth of coworking companies on A+ and A properties in the main cities to various factors, but mainly to the widespread adoption of hybrid work. "Workspace usage is much more efficient when you have flexible spaces, which coworking spaces provide. This has led to the sector's significant growth as tenants during the pandemic. The trend towards flexibility is irreversible and has been a significant achievement of the pandemic period when working from home became the norm", explained the executive.

Alves believes that the sector will continue to grow in the coming years. "Major international consulting firms project that by 2023, one-third of properties will feature some type of flexible space, whether operated by a coworking player, the owner themselves, or a tenant", he said.

Regus and Spaces are part of the British IWG Group, which pioneered the concept of hybrid work thirty years ago. When selecting assets to install operations, the executive explained that the main factors considered are location, preferably near public transportation, asset quality, and even secondary and residential areas. "Customers now demand spaces in regions beyond the central business districts (CBDs) and want to work closer to home. Moreover, with hybrid work, doors have opened to a new opportunity to hire talent from cities in the interior or other regions outside the major cities", added Alves.