Most Melbourne businesses underestimate how long an office fitout actually takes — not because the build is slow, but because furniture lead times, building approvals and supplier scheduling stack, not run in parallel. If you’re planning a relocation, refresh or new lease commencement, getting the timeline right is what protects your move-in date.
Here is a practical breakdown of what a 6, 8 and 12-week fitout looks like in Melbourne and Geelong, what drives the difference, and where projects most often slip.
Why fitout timelines matter more than people think
A delayed fitout doesn’t just push back a move-in date. It can mean:
- Paying double rent on overlapping leases.
- Staff working from boxes or temporary spaces.
- Missed client visits and disrupted onboarding.
- Rushed furniture decisions that get re-bought 12 months later.
The businesses that move smoothly are the ones who lock in a realistic schedule before signing a lease or committing to a handover date — not after.
The three honest timelines
Every project is different, but most Melbourne/Geelong office fitouts fall into one of three brackets.
6-week fitout — light refresh
Picture a Cremorne agency, 25 staff, lease renewed, wants the place to feel newer by EOFY. No walls moving, no landlord drama — just paint, new workstations, a refreshed meeting room and better task chairs. That’s a 6-week job, and it lives or dies on stock availability.
Best fit: existing tenancy you already occupy, cosmetic refresh (paint, flooring patches, new workstations, meeting room update), no structural changes, no new partitions, no significant electrical work.
Typical schedule:
- Week 1: Brief, measure-up, furniture selection, finishes locked in.
- Week 2: Orders placed (workstations, task chairs, soft seating). Trades booked.
- Weeks 3-4: Paint, flooring, minor electrical, data points.
- Week 5: Furniture delivery and installation.
- Week 6: Snag list, final clean, handover.
Where 6-week jobs slip: stock availability on chairs and workstations, and trying to keep staff on-site during works (which slows everything down).
8-week fitout — standard SME refit
Best fit:
- New tenancy or material reconfiguration.
- New meeting rooms, breakout area, reception update.
- Some partitioning, joinery and AV.
Typical schedule:
- Weeks 1-2: Brief, space plan, design concept, furniture and finishes specification.
- Week 3: Council/landlord approvals submitted, long-lead furniture ordered.
- Weeks 4-5: Partition framing, electrical and data rough-in, joinery fabrication off-site.
- Week 6: Plastering, painting, flooring.
- Week 7: Joinery install, AV, furniture delivery.
- Week 8: Commissioning, defect list, handover.
What blows the 8-week timeline: landlord approval delays (allow 2-3 weeks, not “a few days”), and bespoke joinery or acoustic pods that quietly carry 4-6 week lead times.
12-week fitout — full commercial fitout
Best fit:
- New floor or significantly larger footprint.
- Multiple meeting rooms, boardroom, reception, kitchen/breakout.
- Mechanical (HVAC) and fire services changes.
- Branded interiors and bespoke joinery — think a custom-veneer boardroom table, acoustic-felt feature walls, or a reception desk built to the brand palette.
Typical schedule:
- Weeks 1-3: Design development, space plan sign-off, detailed documentation.
- Week 4: Permits, landlord consents, long-lead procurement (boardroom tables, acoustic pods, custom workstations).
- Weeks 5-7: Demolition, partitioning, services (electrical, data, mechanical, fire).
- Weeks 8-9: Ceilings, flooring, painting, joinery install.
- Weeks 10-11: Furniture delivery, AV install, signage, branding.
- Week 12: Final commissioning, cleaning, defects, handover.
The 12-week traps: long-lead items (executive seating, custom joinery, acoustic pods) ordered too late, and mechanical/fire services sign-off, which often sits outside the fitout contractor’s direct control.
Where Melbourne and Geelong fitouts most often slip
After running projects across both metros, the same delays come up again and again:
- Furniture lead times underestimated. Quality task chairs, height-adjustable desks and acoustic pods are frequently 4-8 weeks. Order them with the design, not after the build starts.
- Landlord approvals treated as a formality. Most commercial leases require written landlord consent for any works. Build in 2-3 weeks.
- IT and AV scheduled too late. Cabling, access points and meeting room AV need to be coordinated with the electrical rough-in, not after furniture lands.
- No buffer week. A 6-week project with zero buffer is really a 7-week project the moment one delivery slips.
- Trying to occupy during works. Productivity drops and trades lose hours each day. If you have to stay in, stage the works carefully.
A practical decision framework
Before locking in your timeline, answer these:
- When is the lease commencement or hard move-in date?
- Are there any items requiring landlord, council or owners’ corporation approval?
- Which furniture items are bespoke or in custom finishes (longer lead times)?
- Can staff work off-site or from a partial floor during the build?
- Who owns the AV, data and IT cutover — is it on the same timeline?
- Have you booked a defect/snag week before go-live, or are you assuming “day one” works?
If you can’t answer those, you don’t have a timeline yet — you have a hope.
The Melbourne and Geelong operational angle
A few things matter locally:
- Geelong supply runs. Quality furniture and joinery often comes from Melbourne suppliers, so factor delivery scheduling across the highway, especially around peak freight weeks.
- Building access in CBD towers. Many Melbourne CBD buildings restrict deliveries and trades to after-hours, which extends programs if not planned in.
- Regional trades availability. In Geelong and the western corridor, electrical and data trades can be tight in busy quarters — book early.
- End-of-financial-year squeeze. Many businesses want to be in before 30 June or before the January return. Both windows are heavily booked; lock contractors in early.
How The Agile Office runs fitouts on time
What we usually find when we walk a Melbourne tenancy is that the timeline already exists — it’s just nobody’s worked backwards from the move-in date to the day the chairs need to be ordered. By the time someone calls a builder, the 8-week project is already a 10-week one, and the “we’ll sort furniture later” decision has just added another fortnight.
We plan it the other way round: realistic timeline first, then design and procurement built around it, with long-lead furniture ordered the moment finishes are locked. We deliver office fitouts across Melbourne and Geelong, including refurbishments, new tenancies and staged upgrades, and we coordinate the furniture, joinery, partitioning and AV in one program rather than four.
Map the timeline before you sign anything
If you’re holding a lease commencement date, a relocation deadline, or a board-mandated refresh, the cheapest thing you can do today is map a realistic schedule before committing to a builder or signing furniture orders.
Book a free 30-minute Melbourne or Geelong site walkthrough and we’ll work through your move-in date, long-lead items and the right 6, 8 or 12-week schedule — including the honest answer if your timeline says you should be talking to a builder first, not a fitout partner.
