100x120 hangar at MKE (Milwaukee Mitchell), $1

There is a catch.

Article might be behind a paywall. Gist of it is $30isk K per year. One year leases only. You take on the requirement to tear it down if airport does not renew your lease or if you can't find a new tenant when you leave.

Hangar should be though of as 4 50x60 units. There are 4 doors, 2 face West, 2 face East. There is a center office/bathroom structure, but interior is otherwise wide open.

https://www.jsonline.com/story/money/bu ... 775246007/

The article was also sent out in their daily email newsletter. This link might bypass the paywall.
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He wants to give away an airplane hangar at Milwaukee Mitchell Airport, but he's hitting a snag

Still looking for that perfect Christmas gift for your loved one, for cheap? Let's go over the Facebook Marketplace and see what ... oh, look, it's a free airplane hangar.


"Free 100'x120' Hangar," Waukesha resident Ryan Luetzow has posted. "Take over our lease and it's yours."


Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport leases land to Luetzow and five other tenants for general aviation – private personal or business flights – on the airport’s northeast airfield quadrant. Luetzow, 42, recently decided to give his airplane hangar away, but the airport’s new shorter, more expensive lease terms are making it hard to find a taker.


Luetzow's been trying to sell the hangar for about six years, starting with an asking price of around $100,000. He had prospective buyers come close to drafting a purchase contract before backing out, Luetzow said. After years of no takers, he now just wants it gone.


So what's the ... uh, hang-up? Francesca Pica has the full story.

https://cl.exct.net/?qs=2fd859d0379cf17 ... 34be924fad

An economist would say the airport authority has found the efficient rent, exactly the right amount to make the building worth $0.

I think the uncertainty of 1 year leases sounds like the biggest problem. A business can’t afford to move in and then have to move out in a year. The building might be worth something if a longer lease were available, even at the new and higher prices.

There is about 60 acres here available for GA redevelopment. A little over half is open land. The other half is older hangars that have been built and changed hands over the years.

There were two tee hangars that have been torn down because of the inability to meet the lease requirements they were presented with (and they elected to not fight it). Those tees were half filled with junk, but there were 10 active aircraft displaced.

There have been 2 really nice large hangars torn down because the owner was furious that they exercised reversion. He is now out at Waukesha.

I have been here for 10 years. My lease just expired and my new lease is currently under what I think will be final review with the county risk department. It is a one year lease, but the total expense for me is not unreasonable. (It is an increase as I now pay land lease and building rent, whereas it was just a land lease)

The last two items of contention in my lease are the aircraft liability insurance requirements ($5M when I've told them the best I can get is $1M) and a weird disconnect on the teardown requirement.

They still want me on the hook for the teardown, so they are using the term "reversion deferral fee" in the emails, but that does not appear in the lease. The lease just says land rent and building rent.

I am holding on as long as I can. I love being based here.

I wonder what the cost would be to disassemble and move it? They tore down a couple big hangers at KGRB last year and I was told it was cost effective to relocate them, but I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around that.

Made AvWeb news

https://avweb.com/aviation-news/free-ha ... l-airport/

He is entertaining those discussions now, too.

Made the front page of the local paper.

Bureaucracy at its finest.

Jim and his fellow tenants are the roadkill of clueless and malignant airport officials.

Theirs is a case study in the fragility of airport property leases connected to hangars.

I had an interesting conversation with a hangar association officer who told me that the association takes a very long view of their lease, basically timing their renegotiation of the property lease with airport officials who are “friendly” to the protection and advancement of G/A.

This particular hangar association opened discussions with the airport authority mid-lease, negotiating terms of a very favorable lease with a(n) renewal/expiry date of 2060!! As the owner of hangars, it never occurred to me to open lease negotiations with the leaseholder while things are “friendly” to G/A.

But it might be a worthwhile consideration for any of us.

Would be nice if someone could publish guidelines for a fair lease, for GA, that includes owning the building on leased dirt. Lotta politics, caveats, dangers and nuances on leases. Even when the airport has nothing to generate $$ but 100LL......
Thanks!

The size of the municipal entity behind the airport sponsor seems to directly correlate to the size and complexity of the lease. Mine here in Milwaukee is 64 pages.

The other activity that seems to drive a lot of consultant revenue and copy-pasta complexity are minimum standards documents. The FAA expects airports to have them, so the consultants are happy to help airports write them.

The Minneapolis Airport Commission that manages the 6 reliever airports around the Twin Cities seems to have figured out a successful formula. No reversion clauses. No hangars owned by the commission. Two types of leases: storage (private hangars) and commercial (everything else). Tee hangars are not treated as commercial operators.

a scrap metal company should take it
sub-lease to cover the yearly lease until the county terminates
Then turn the building into scrap steel

The size of the municipal entity behind the airport sponsor seems to directly correlate to the size and complexity of the lease. Mine here in Milwaukee is 64 pages.

The other activity that seems to drive a lot of consultant revenue and copy-pasta complexity are minimum standards documents. The FAA expects airports to have them, so the consultants are happy to help airports write them.

The Minneapolis Airport Commission that manages the 6 reliever airports around the Twin Cities seems to have figured out a successful formula. No reversion clauses. No hangars owned by the commission. Two types of leases: storage (private hangars) and commercial (everything else). Tee hangars are not treated as commercial operators.

What do you think the value of the steel might be? The quotes for teardown have been $38-40k. The annual rent is $30k. I would not guess the steel is that valuable, but I'm not sure.

I think if you want to sublet that makes you a commercial operator. That comes with some pretty high insurance requirements. I can dig up the minimum standards if you want me to confirm.

Having recently purchased a hangar at KANE, I needed to go through the lease transfer process with the Minneapolis Airport Commission (MAC). I was not looking forward to that process as there is a lot of negative chatter regarding MAC.

To my delight, MAC was very easy to deal with and the folks I interacted with were friendly and helpful.

I wish all government agencies worked like that.