Cell Tower Income & Compensation |
At ASI, our goal is to maximize the cell tower income on a landowner’s property by marketing and leasing the property to multiple cell phone companies. If interest is expressed by a wireless carrier, we perform a fair market rent analysis to determine the value of the property. Once this is complete, we negotiate a monthly rental amount as well as the terms and conditions of a lease agreement which includes the proposed construction of the cell site. Finally, we handle any inquiries that may arise related to the property for both new tenants and existing tenants. In exchange for the foregoing services, ASI fees are a percentage of all rents and fees collected from cell phone or tower tenants on the property.
ASI does not charge any application or start-up fees for its services and a landowner does not pay anything to ASI if a cell phone company or tower company tenant does not utilize the property. In other words, we don’t make money unless you do.
As you can see, the additional cell tower income that may be generated by a cell phone tower lease on a landowner's property is quite attractive. In fact, the cell phone companies are typically credit tenants who usually pay their rent on time (in most instances, the rent checks are computer generated and arrive on the same day of each month), and after the initial construction, there is a minimal impact on the landowner's property. In addition, the leases are relatively long-term (between 20-30 years) and are rarely terminated before their expiration. Given these benefits, every landowner should welcome the opportunity to generate additional revenue on their property. Unfortunately, the reality is that there are an extremely small number of landowners nationwide who are fortunate enough to have a cell phone company or tower company lease on their property. The reason is that cell phone companies want to be in specific locations within a given geographic area or "search ring" to satisfy their cell phone coverage needs and those locations must each have certain unique characteristics that differentiate themselves from other properties such as:
- i) the tallest building relative to the surrounding buildings,
- ii) the highest elevation relative to the surrounding properties,
- iii) the property is located on or near a major thoroughfare or highway,
- iv) the property is located in a densely populated area.
Accordingly, without understanding the cell site development process or working regularly with those in the industry, there is very little a landowner can do to increase the likelihood of leasing his or her property to a cell phone company. Please note that we mention the foregoing not to discourage landowner’s from seeking out cell phone company tenants, rather, to set reasonable expectations for our clients. With this in mind, ASI will actively market and promote your properties to the cell phone and tower companies that we believe will be of interest to them. We have established relationships with those people who are responsible for leasing properties on behalf of cell phone companies and we regularly communicate with them regarding our portfolio of potential sites.