Property with private airstrip

[Markster12000]

Good afternoon.

I am appraising a property with a private FAA approved airstrip. Does anyone have any good advice on finding comparable sales and/or determining a value for such an amenity? Thank you for any assistance.

Mark

 

[General D]

Determine if the airstrip is a private or public and treat the runway as an amenity or a feature. If the property has a aircraft hanger(s) value it as a pole barn or an outbuilding and determine its contributory value to the property, cost approach less depreciation. If the landing strip is paved treat it as a long driveway and value it, less depreciation also. If it is a grass runway consider it as excess or surplus land, you decide. Overall, the markets contributory value for this amenity would be less than the cost to install.

 

[CindyR]

I just finished one of these. it was fun, that's for sure. I would observe that having a landing strip in your front yard was a very valuable feature to people with planes and would exhibit significant functional obsolescence to those without. same with hangars - if you have a plane it is worth every penny of the cost and if you are not airplane people living on a runway it is worthless.

mine was a private airpark but it was a real FAA registered runway. 14 lots total but only 9 homes built, so far.

 

[VolcanoLvr]

You don't say if it is grass or paved. It makes a difference.

You may have to search a wide regional area, which is acceptable in this case. To heck with typical requirements of w/in 1 mile, with comp front doors painted the same color as the subject.

If your MLS has a 'random word' search function, put in "airstrip", "landing strip", "runway", or something similar. This type of search picks up any written comment the listing agent makes in the comment field. (I just did this for an 'equestrian' property I appraised.)

If you can find such properties that have sold, regardless of location, the contributory value of the airstrip will be included in the sale price. You might need to do a CA to determine it's value by using extraction, and then compute the value per foot it contributes. Then apply that value to your airstrip, adjusting as necessary.

One thing for sure....any property like this will be on acreage, with a minimum distance of 2,500' for the airstrip.

 

[Terrel L. Shields]

We have a sale Nov of 2012 for $1.3 million. Includes paved strip, Hangar and office, several houses...two very nice but older homes with maybe 200 acres or more. Next to a lake. It is just north of Decatur, Arkansas (if you can see the lake to the north side of the town on google earth, the strip is right by it)

I can send you the tax cards - I may have some better photos as I appraised the estate several years ago, and I don't recall if it was in the MLS but I can give you the name of the broker that likely sold it. Just send me a private message (see the upper right hand of the page) with your email address.

 

[Metamorphic]

You'll probably find a lot more data for the shared access private airpark variety that Cindy mentioned. If I was reviewing and you argued that private private airfield is superadequate to the point that there's no advantage over sharing an airfield with a dozen other pilots I'd buy it. Certainly the shared maintenance costs would significantly offset whatever advantage sole-use provided.

Its amazing how many potential comps you turn doing an MLS word search for "airstrip", "runway", "hangar", "taxiway", "plane", "airplane", etc.

 

[Papoua Jose]

I just finished one of these. it was fun, that's for sure. I would observe that having a landing strip in your front yard was a very valuable feature to people with planes and would exhibit significant functional obsolescence to those without. same with hangars .

I know someone who isn't a pilot who bought into a farm with an airstrip and hanger. The grass strip became a hayfield and the hanger was turned into a large workshop and place for his teenage son's to practice with their metal band.....far enough away from the house for that to be possible.

 

[Terrel L. Shields]

There are a lot of farms with small grass fields, but an FAA regulated field is a far cry from that. This is the one I mention above. Just remember if you aren't stopped or flying, the SE end of the runway dumps you off in the lake...

 

[TxArmadillo]

There was an extensive thread on this topic about two years ago. A search for that provide some good results.