Rooftop Management
Just joined the sub after getting hired as the head site acquisition manager at a large privately owned telecommunications company. No solicitation intended however, I would like to know how many people that do commercial real estate know about or currently have contracts with rooftop management companies? What have your experiences been like? And is there anything that could potentially be improved about the entire process? Feedback welcome as always!

Thanks for the time folks
[{"id": "fxv4gbr", "text": "Don't just slap a solar array on a bad roof. Solar is for good roofs.", "replies": [{"id": "fxv72pd", "text": "I should have specified in my post but my company is telecommunications based. Currently building out the 5G network capabilities for the big three carriers ( four soon w direct tv ). Rooftop wise we deal mainly in antenna and dishes not solar.", "replies": [{"id": "fxv8y6u", "text": "If you don't mind me asking, what type of person or position do you talk to who makes those decisions? I'm about to start dabbling in commercial electricity sales but I don't really know if I'm supposed to be talking to the facilities manager or COO or head office secretary.\n\nsupposedly I'm getting the lead list tomorrow so I will see how good quality they are or if I'm just being a schmuck.", "replies": [{"id": "fxv9vag", "text": "There are obviously many routes because multiple people can get my information to who it needs to go to however, I always prefer to deal with building owners or managers because they're  usually the ones making the decision. Once I show a higher up that they can be making thousands of extra dollars a month just by throwing an antenna or two on top of a previously unused rooftop its a no brainier.", "replies": [{"id": "fxvg3gj", "text": "So I am thinking that commercial electricity sales, particularly when the customer is paying ~$5-10k/month would be a pretty good selling point because \na) in markets where you can change providers, it often makes sense to\nb) the 'sales reps' in this market are dumb as rocks so building owners wouldn't be caught dead talking to them \n\nOnly in a few states (CA, CT, DC, IL, MD, MA, NJ, NY, OH, PA, RI, TX) but since I know rate structures very well, I figure my input to a building manager would be valuable enough to get their ear.  \n\nThe solar industry has borrowed too much from the antenna industry regarding racking designs. There are better racking methods than concrete ballast when covering an entire roof. \n\nI know the newer solar arrays can interfere with HAM radios due to the required safety electronics required. I wonder about antenna interference.", "replies": [], "depth": 5}], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "g03zk6v", "text": "Rooftop management company sounds like you're working in one of a handful of large cities. I have never heard of such a company but I'm also not in a major city. In your position I would prefer to deal directly with the owners because adding a middle man adds costs and complexity to getting things done in general. Let's say the owner would take $4k/month but the management company wants their cut too, so now it's $5k/mo, you end up losing, find the owner and save the $1k/month. If anyone ever asked me to place an antenna I would certainly work to get it done. I've always wanted a cell tower, always seemed like easy mailbox money.", "replies": [{"id": "g040frv", "text": "We work all over the country big cities and small. Obviously an owner would prefer 5k to 4k but the owner would never see anything without us directly marketing the rooftop to the clients (Big telecom, government, state/local etc.) We do towers too, own 300+ throughout the country. If you were ever interested, and the location was right, we could build a tower quite easily.", "replies": [{"id": "g043qf6", "text": "Your text implied you worked at a telco and you were in charge of finding roofs and owners of roofs, not the middleman trying to get a cut while marketing to the telcos that actually place the antennas. \n\nWhat is a typical lease like in $/mo what is your cut?", "replies": [{"id": "g044w4f", "text": "Well my company does both rooftop management and build/own/operate cell towers, just for the sake of commercial real estate sub I focused on rooftop aspect. I hesitate to call us a middle man because essentially we would own the rights to the rooftop for a 5 year period ( with the owner getting final say in most aspects involved ). That being said our standard lease is a 5 year term 70/30 split, which is much better than all of the large publicly owned firms usually doing 60/40. $/month depends on location and equipment installed", "replies": [{"id": "g0476st", "text": "Let's say a 5g T-Mobile antenna in a city of 100k people? \n\nI have never seen an antenna for sale by itself only with an existing building or an otherwise improved parcel. What kind of cap rate would a freestanding tower on an unimproved parcel go for with let's say 5 years left on the lease from a telco?", "replies": [{"id": "g048ot3", "text": "Most of what you\u2019re asking is highly dependent on area, people, the telco\u2019s need for service, and what other structures are nearby. A larger antenna on average nets anywhere from $750-2,000. Let\u2019s take Dish\u2019s new massive undertaking to build their network out next year, we have three separate rates depending on the size and collocation. The tower question is hard to speculate, the land is valuable yes and we would need to know location and if there are carriers present on it. We would try to eventually buy out the lease if it\u2019s 5 years or less especially if we were to properly manage it.", "replies": [], "depth": 6}], "depth": 5}], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}]