Going home for the Chinese New Year with a year-end bonus of 100 million

The second place is inside the university town, on the third floor of a commercial and residential building facing the street.

The landlord was a man in his fifties surnamed Zhao, and as Zhou Yao had said, he was indeed a friend of her father.

"Yaoyao's here!" Uncle Zhao said warmly. "This must be Xiao Yang, right? Old Zhou has mentioned you; you're young and promising!"

"Hello Uncle Zhao, thank you for your help." Yang Fan shook hands politely.

"No trouble at all! Come on, I'll take you upstairs to have a look!"

There is indeed no elevator in the building; you have to climb three flights of stairs. The stairs aren't steep, but they are definitely inconvenient for guests carrying laptops or suitcases.

The entire third floor is empty; the partitions left by the original training institution have been removed, leaving a large open space of about 1,200 square meters.

It has excellent natural light, with windows on all four sides.

"I used to rent this place to a training institution. They worked there for five years and moved out last year."

Uncle Zhao explained, "The ceiling is high enough, and the ventilation is good. If you're building an e-sports hotel, dividing it into rooms would be perfect."

He walked a few steps in the open space, gesturing to indicate his name:

"We can partition off a reception area here, a public lounge area here, and separate rooms over there... I reckon we can easily partition off about thirty rooms."

Yang Fan examined it carefully. The venue was well-proportioned and easy to plan. Moreover, the location was superb—there was a food street downstairs, a supermarket across the street, and it really only took seven or eight minutes to walk to the nearest university dormitory building.

"Uncle Zhao," Yang Fan asked, "how much is the rent?"

Uncle Zhao readily agreed: "Yaoyao's friend is one of us! The monthly rent for this floor is 35,000, two months' deposit and one month's rent in advance. If you're really serious about it, I'll give you a discount to 32,000! At this price, in this location, you absolutely won't find another place like it!"

Zhou Yao whispered to Yang Fan, "Brother Fan, this price is really reasonable. Other houses in the same area, with this size, would cost at least 40,000 or more."

Yang Fan nodded and then asked, "Uncle Zhao, is it possible to install an elevator in this building in the future?"

Uncle Zhao paused for a moment, then shook his head with a wry smile:

"It's difficult. This building is almost twenty years old, and the structure doesn't allow it."

"Moreover, installing an elevator requires the consent of all homeowners, which involves complicated procedures and high costs. I doubt it will happen."

That's true. Installing elevators in old buildings is a difficult problem in many parts of China.

Yang Fan quickly weighed the options in his mind: perfect location, affordable price, and moderate size.

The only major drawback is the lack of an elevator.

He recalled his experience of going out to surf the internet all night with his roommates during his college years.

Back then, we were young, and climbing a few floors was nothing.

But now... the main consumers are students born in the 00s or even the 05s, who grew up in a more convenient environment.

Would they be willing to climb three floors just to play video games?

"Uncle Zhao, thank you. We really like this place, but the elevator issue... we'll have to think about it some more."

Yang Fan said very politely.

Uncle Zhao expressed his understanding: "It's alright, it's alright! Take your time to think it over! There really is a problem with the elevator, I won't hide it from you. Anyway, contact me anytime you've made up your mind!"

As they went downstairs, Zhou Yao whispered, "Fan-ge, is it because of the elevator?"

"Yes." Yang Fan nodded. "In business today, user experience is extremely important."

"Making someone climb three floors, even just three, might deter many people."

"Especially those who bring suitcases and plan to stay for a few days, or those who come in groups to play games with a lot of equipment."

Zhou Yao said thoughtfully, "That's true... Sometimes when I go to places without elevators to visit friends, I find climbing stairs annoying."

"Let's go," Yang Fan said, "let's go see one last place, that billiards hall."

……

The third location was indeed, as Zhou Yao had said, in an excellent position.

As soon as the car entered the core area of ​​the university town, a four-story building came into view.

The first floor has several street-facing shops—a milk tea shop, a convenience store, and a snack shop.

The exterior walls of the second and third floors are huge glass curtain walls. Although the blinds are now drawn, one can imagine the grandeur of the original billiard hall.

The fourth floor appears to be an office area or warehouse.

There is a conspicuous sign frame on the side of the building. Although the words on it have been removed, the frame is still there. It is clear that it used to hang a large sign such as "XX Billiards Club".

The real estate agent was already waiting at the door. He was a young man in his early thirties, dressed in a casual suit, and looked very capable.

"Mr. Yang, Ms. Zhou, hello! I'm Wang Lei from Zhongcheng Real Estate!" the agent greeted him warmly.

"This place is great, isn't it? I dare say you won't find another spot in the entire university town that's so perfectly square and centrally located!"

As he spoke, he opened the side access door: "Let's go in and take a look! This building has elevators, both freight and passenger elevators!"

The elevator was indeed spacious and ran smoothly. When it reached the third floor and the doors opened, the sight before Yang Fan was somewhat shocked.

The space has a ceiling height of over 2,000 square meters, and you can hardly see the end of it when you look at it.

Although it's currently empty, with only some dismantled billiard table frames and miscellaneous items piled up, you can tell that the original renovation was quite good—the floor was a smooth epoxy floor, the ceiling had neat light troughs and fire sprinkler pipes, and several load-bearing columns stood orderly in the space.

"Many of the original billiard hall's decor can be reused," agent Wang Lei explained as they walked.

"Look at this wiring, it's all been re-laid out, and the load capacity is sufficient. Fiber optic internet is also connected to every floor. The fire protection system was just upgraded two years ago and is fully qualified."

He walked to the window and pulled back the blinds: "The lighting is amazing! There are windows on all four sides! At night, you can see the night view of the university town!"

Yang Fan walked to the window. The view was indeed expansive, showing the neon signs of the food court across the street, the outlines of several university buildings in the distance, and the bustling student crowd below.

It was morning, and there were already many students on the street.

"This floor actually has a total area of ​​2,200 square meters," Wang Lei said.

"There's another 500 square meters on the fourth floor, which used to be an office area and staff lounge."

"If we rent it, the landlord is willing to rent the third and fourth floors together, totaling 2,700 square meters. The price is negotiable."

Zhou Yao exclaimed softly from the side, "Two thousand seven hundred square meters... If this were all converted into e-sports rooms, how many rooms would there be..."

Wang Lei, with his sharp ears, heard it and immediately chimed in:

"I've done the math for you guys! If each room is 20 to 25 square meters, plus the common areas, reception, lounge, storage room, equipment room... the third floor can be partitioned into at least 70 standard rooms!"

"The fourth floor could be converted into high-end themed rooms or multi-player gaming suites, about twenty of them! In total, ninety to one hundred rooms wouldn't be a problem!"

He became more and more excited as he spoke: "Mr. Yang, just think about it, this university town has four or five universities, with a total of nearly 100,000 students!"

"Esports is one of the most popular forms of entertainment among young people these days! If you opened an esports hotel here, the biggest in town, with top-notch facilities, the business... would absolutely be booming!"

Yang Fan didn't reply, but walked slowly in the open space, calculating rapidly in his mind.

Ninety to one hundred rooms. If we assume an average occupancy rate of 60%, that means more than fifty rooms have guests every day.

If each room costs between 200 and 300 yuan, it's easy to generate over 10,000 yuan in daily revenue.

The monthly turnover is over 300,000.

After deducting rent, utilities, labor costs, and equipment depreciation, the profit margin should be considerable.

But the initial investment... is indeed, as Zhou Yao said, astronomical.

Rent, renovations, equipment... the initial investment can be substantial.

In total, the initial investment would be at least seven or eight million.