A number of our clients have been receiving requests from their tenants (most notably wireless carriers like AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint) regarding the installation of additional telephone equipment onto the leased cell site. Typically, these requests come in the form of letters asking for the property owners’ consent and might imply that the underlying lease allows for these changes.
In many cases, we believe that these letters express, at best, half-truths. While in many cases, the tower lease or rooftop lease does allow for the replacement of existing antennas, it may not always allow for additional antennas. Carriers take very optimistic interpretations of what they are allowed to do under the lease agreement. Perhaps they expect that you, the property owner, won’t be sophisticated enough to understand the changes because they use technical jargon like “TMA,” “LTE,” “RRU” or “diplexer,” and send complicated spec sheets for the new equipment that only Radio Frequency engineers can understand.
