Steel in the Air, INC.

Cell Tower Lease Rates - Comparable Data / HOME

Cell Tower Lease Rates - Comparable Data

One of the things that we believe sets us apart from our competitors is the quality of the data that we have assembled over the last 14 years. In 1999, we started collecting datasets of cell tower locations across the U.S. Our data includes not only the cell tower locations, but in many cases, cell tower lease rates including both ground leases (lease between tower owner and the landowner) and tenant leases (lease between the tower owner and other wireless carriers who have collocated on the tower).

Over the last 14 years, our proprietary database has grown to encompass over 200,000 cell tower and cell site locations including rooftops and other structures. Our data comes from a few public sources like the FCC data but also from many private sources, most of which are not available to the general public. We believe that our database is one of the most thorough databases in the country. We spend over $100,000 a year in maintaining the database.

The database includes the following information to the extent known:

• Cell Tower Location
• Cell Tower Type
• Height of Tower
• Latitude and Longitude of Tower
• FCC Identification Number (if registered)
• Carriers on the Tower (if known)
• Owner of the Tower
• Initial Owner/Developer of the Tower
• Ground Lease Rate
• Collocation Lease Rates
• Lease Buyout Offers attached to the tower

Over the course of providing over 3,000 consultations nationwide, we have also incorporated information from those clients into our database. These clients and other potential clients have shared over 7,500 individual cell tower rental rates and comparable data, which span the United States. As part of these projects, we are continually receiving cell tower rental rate and collocation rate data for cell towers and rooftop sites and we immediately add them to the database.

We keep detailed logs on every online newspaper article that we find that mentions cell tower rental rates. In addition, we actively poll municipalities on any available rental lease rate data for towers. As a result, there are few areas of the country we don't have good data on cell tower rental rates. We have lease rate data in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean. When people submit inquiries to our website, we track that data as well.

Please note: We take our potential client's confidentiality seriously and NEVER sell or distribute this data. We do use the cell tower lease rate data in our assessments, but never with any information that would disclose who provided the data or the specific location of the underlying site. For example, we may suggest to our clients that we are aware of an AT&T lease that pays $1000/mo in St. Louis, MO, but we will never divulge site addresses or share the client's name or location.

To better accommodate our clients; we developed a custom mapping application that allows us to see our tower data on high-resolution aerial photography along with terrain. This enables us to determine what other towers or cell sites are in the area of the subject site and whether there is potential for consolidation. We also incorporated our cell tower rental rates into Google Earth allowing us to view cell tower rental rates of the other towers closest to your property or location.

How do we review a site in California when we are in Fort Myers? We make it our business to know exactly how to find necessary information quickly. Below is a screen shot of our tower database application. With it, we can search by tenant, by landowner, by structure height, by cell tower lease rate, by address, and by site name or number. We often know more about our client’s cell towers then they do.

We also track lease buyout offers: What carrier they come from; what date they were offered; how long the purchase offer is for; and how many months of rent the purchase offer represents. We have done this for over 2,000 lease buyout offers representing nearly 10 various buyers of cell tower leases. We also track extension offers so if you receive an offer to extend your tower lease, we can compare what lease rate other landowners or building owners in similar situations received.

It is this data centric focus of Steel in the Air, Inc. that allows us to provide logical and data-drive and substantiated analysis that we do. We don’t guess at what AT&T will pay for a new lease in a given area or what Crown Castle will pay to extend a lease with 5 years left on it and two carriers using the tower, we know it because we have represented other landowners with similar cell tower leases.

If you have questions, please either see our page on Cell Tower Location Data or Contact Us for more information.

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