Offices and commercial premises to rent in Bab El Bhar

A good share of the head offices in Tunis sits at three addresses within the Bab El Bhar delegation: Les Berges du Lac, the Centre Urbain Nord and the historic city centre. The banks have left Avenue Habib Bourguiba for the Lac, the law firms have stayed in Lafayette, and service companies and start-ups have moved into the office buildings of the Centre Urbain Nord. Retail, for its part, still holds the avenue and the streets running off it.

On houni.tn, the office floors, consulting rooms, shops and storage units to rent in the delegation are published by owners, developers and specialist agencies.

Office floors: Centre Urbain Nord and Les Berges du Lac

Office space in the Centre Urbain Nord means floors of 80 to 400 sqm in commercial buildings that have gone up since the 2000s, around the Golden Towers and Avenue Hédi Karray, delivered as a shell or as open plan, with central air conditioning, lifts and parking billed separately. Budget between 20 and 35 DT per sqm a month, excluding VAT and service charges, for a decent floor; a little more in Lac 2 in the recent buildings.

Les Berges du Lac 1 and 2 are the head-office segment: banks, insurers, multinationals, with whole buildings let to a single company and floors coming free with every relocation. Lac 1, older, offers offices in mixed residential and office buildings, cheaper, where a practice or a small agency can also set up.

Montplaisir, on the Avenue Mohamed V side, remains the address for clinics, laboratories and medical practices, with 1980s office buildings at more moderate rents.

Shops and commercial premises in the city centre

Commercial premises to rent in central Tunis are judged on three things: the shopfront, the pedestrian flow and the key money. On Avenue Habib Bourguiba, Avenue de France, Rue Charles de Gaulle or Avenue de Carthage, footfall is the highest in Tunis, but leases are often passed on with a high entry payment (the "khlou") and rents to match. The parallel streets, Rue d'Espagne, Rue Ibn Khaldoun, Rue de Marseille, offer comparable areas for a great deal less, with office workers as lunchtime customers.

Lafayette and Avenue de la Liberté suit local shops, salons and ground-floor practices. Storage units and small workshops are found instead towards Rue Al Jazira and the lower Medina, at the edge of the delegation.

Two years of trading, and the tenant is protected

Commercial leases in Tunisia fall under the 1977 law on commercial tenancies, which gives the tenant a right of renewal after two years of trading: the landlord knows this and bargains hard on the opening rent. Have the contract registered, which is essential for the trade register and the business licence, and set out in writing who pays for building management, security and central air conditioning, often heavy in the towers of the Lac and the Centre Urbain Nord.

For a firm of five to ten people, a floor in Lac 1 or Montplaisir is often worth more than an office in Lac 2: lower rent, clients who can park, an address that still means something. Keep Lac 2 and the Centre Urbain Nord towers for companies that receive a lot of visitors or need large uninterrupted floor plates.

For the governorate as a whole, the offices and commercial premises to rent in Tunis page covers every delegation. Companies housing staff on short assignments will find furnished units among the apartments to rent in Bab El Bhar, and those who would rather own their premises should look at the offices and commercial premises for sale in Bab El Bhar.