Those who were worried about Sony's long-term health just got a little more reason to bite their collective nails, as Sony Corporation earlier today issued an announcement about its sale of the "Sony City Osaki" office and surrounding premises to the Nippon Building Fund, Inc. and an institutional investor in Japan.

But Sony, along with several Sony Group businesses housed as Sony City Osaki, won't have to pack its collective bags and leave just yet, as the terms of the sale allow said Sony businesses to remain in the building for five years under a lease agreement. Sony put the building and surrounding premises in trust, then sold the beneficiary rights to the trust at a sale price of 111.1 billion yen (around $1.205 billion U.S.), which drops just slightly following the deduction of transaction costs.

All told, Sony looks to gain 41 billion yen (around $444.6 million) which will be recorded as operating income for the fourth quarter of Sony's fiscal year, set to end March 31, 2013.

As for why Sony decided to sell a building, the reason given was simple and rational enough: Sony was out to do some reorganization, and put some steel in its corporate structure, which made selling the building a good idea on that front.

Just how that was to work is a bit less clear, but that's the line that Sony's reportedly putting out.

It likely doesn't hurt that, based on the results of the sale, the consolidated financial forecast now shows a profit for the latest fiscal year. Though some reports seem to indicate that the profitable forecast included the operating revenue gained from the sale of the building, they also suggest Sony may need to reevaluate the exact impact of the sale on the figures, as well as some other factors that weren't completely defined.

This strikes me as a bad sign for Sony overall. An old principle in farming, which was quickly adapted for businesses of a variety of stripes, is that it's a bad idea to "eat the seed corn." Basically, when a business "eats the seed corn," that business is consuming resources that would have been used to yield profit. A result of this is short-term gain – which we're seeing with Sony's newest forecasts – but a long-term loss, as that item sold off – eaten, so to speak – is now no longer in play for Sony to use to make a profit.

While the immediate impact here is likely to be minimal – it still has five years to operate out of that building thanks to the lease – there's going to be an issue in the future. Sony's currently operating out of a leased building. What happens when that lease expires? How much will it cost Sony to renew the lease? What could it have done with that money that might have generated profits?

Sony might essentially be sacrificing a long-term potential gain for a short-term absolute gain, trading two birds in the bush for one in the hand.

Of course, Sony may also be looking to buy some time; its new system should begin rolling out fairly soon – current word puts it as releasing at least somewhere in the holiday season of 2013 – so that may give Sony the operating capital it needs to stay viable in the long term.

Only time will tell if this is a move that saves or kills the company, but at least Sony's not above taking a few chances in the pursuit of staying viable as a company.