A client of mine forwarded to me some documentation that was provided by Cingular and AWS regarding “average ground rent” rates for cell tower leases for a state in the NW. The documentation consisted of a “appraisal” and I use that word loosely and a spreadsheet of 6 different cell tower locations with their ground rents shown.

The information is provided as a means of “encouraging” the landowner to accept the offered tower lease rate that was provided to him that was lower than the average. Yet there is no documentation of the sample of leases that this information was taken from and no indication that it was representative of anything other than that it showed the rents for the towers chosen by the “appraiser” or by AWS as representative.

So why show a landowner that the rate you offered him is lower than the average for the area? Your guess is as good as mine. If you are interested in seeing the report, please feel free to email me for more information.

Ken Schmidt

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