DAS Agreement Attorney for Property Owners
Helping property owners negotiate DAS agreements that protect their interests, define operator obligations, and reflect the full value of their property.
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DAS Agreements
Distributed antenna systems (DAS), both indoor and outdoor, are among the most complex wireless infrastructure arrangements a property owner will encounter. Unlike a traditional cell tower lease, where a single carrier occupies a defined premises, a DAS agreement involves a system operator who installs and manages the antenna network, multiple carrier tenants whose equipment connects to that network, and a property owner whose building or property serves as the host for infrastructure that benefits parties other than themselves. The relationships between these parties, and the legal and financial obligations that flow between them, are rarely spelled out adequately in the agreements that system operators present to building owners.
Coastal Tower Law represents property owners in the negotiation of indoor and outdoor DAS host agreements, ensuring that the terms governing system deployment, carrier access, compensation, and long-term infrastructure rights reflect the value of what the property owner is providing and protect their interests for the life of the system.
Indoor and Outdoor DAS Agreements
Indoor distributed antenna systems are deployed in large commercial buildings, hotels, hospitals, sports arenas, convention centers, universities, and mixed-use developments where cellular coverage cannot be adequately provided by macro network infrastructure outside the building. Outdoor systems are deployed in urban streetscapes, campuses, sports complexes, and transit corridors where macro tower coverage is insufficient and small cell deployments alone cannot meet capacity demands. In both contexts, a system operator — companies like Boldyn, ExteNet, or a carrier acting as its own neutral host — approaches the property owner seeking the right to install antenna infrastructure throughout the facility or across the site, connect to carrier networks, and sell capacity to those carriers over the term of the agreement.
For the property owner, a DAS host agreement raises issues that standard commercial leasing experience does not prepare most owners to navigate. The primary contractual relationship is with the system operator, not the carriers whose service runs over the network — meaning the property owner must understand what rights and obligations flow through to the carriers, and what happens when a carrier departs or the operator assigns the agreement to a successor. Outdoor systems on municipally-owned infrastructure carry additional considerations: fee structures must be consistent with applicable FCC limitations, and the agreement must coordinate with any existing small cell or pole attachment policies already governing use of that infrastructure.
What We Negotiate
Whether the system is indoor or outdoor, the core negotiating objectives are the same: compensation that reflects the value of the access being provided, infrastructure rights that protect the property owner’s long-term control over their facility, and contractual obligations that ensure the operator and its carrier tenants cannot expand, assign, or modify the system without the property owner’s informed consent. Specific provisions we address include:
- License fee structure, base compensation, and escalation
- Revenue sharing terms and audit rights to verify carrier revenues on which sharing calculations are based
- Scope of any exclusivity grant and carve-outs preserving the property owner’s flexibility
- Consent rights for carrier additions, system expansions, and equipment modifications
- Assignment and change of control provisions, which are particularly important given the active consolidation among DAS system operators
- Default and termination rights, including step-in rights if the operator fails to maintain the system
- Indemnification and insurance requirements protecting the property owner against liability arising from system installation and operations
- Removal and restoration obligations binding on both the operator and any successor
Contact Coastal Tower Law before you sign a DAS agreement. The compensation and infrastructure terms you agree to at the outset will govern a relationship that may last twenty years or more.