Neptune Basketball Club had a wonderful experience working with APWireless. Ronan, Associate Director, approached us at the perfect time. The club were in the middle of raising money for a series of capital projects to improve our club facilities. We felt our members would benefit greatly by attaining a significant upfront capital payment to re-invest back into the buildings infrastructure. Our biggest priority was to rebuild the roof of the club, since there were consistent leaks that posed a major problem for the committee, teams and functioning of the stadium. To be honest, had APWireless not given us such an incredible offer, we would have found it difficult to get that project off the ground. By using the lump-sum payment from our deal, we were able to re-roof the building and allow our members to practice in all weather conditions, without the threat of water seepage.
In my opinion, working with Ronan was easy. He understood the technical side of the deal and the telecoms market and communicated efficiently with us throughout the process. In short, he did the ‘heavy lifting’, thus allowing us to solely focus on strategically deploying the capital. It was a smooth process once we made the decision to work with APWireless. This endeavour truly benefited Neptune Basketball Club. We were grateful for Ronan’s expert advice, which he so willingly gave from our first interaction. Working with APWireless was an excellent opportunity that gave us the collateral to achieve something more for our members than the telecoms rent would ever allow.
The deal with APWireless also lessened the stress of renegotiating our contract with the mobile operator every few years. As a mast lease landlord, we felt that there were a lot of aspects which we could not control in relation to our mobile operator tenant and license agreement. Being frank, we always felt we were on unstable ground regards the rental income. After we weighed up our options, we truly felt the APWireless offer was one we should avail of. Looking back, we are delighted that we made that decision. We agreed on an agreement that worked in both our best interests. All in all, we found our dealings with Ronan were seamless.
Meeting the needs of a progressive club would have been extremely difficult if we retained the rental income. Receiving increments of rent over time wouldn’t have permitted us to do the important enhancement works needed. I can see how the regular instalments can work for some clubs; however, in our opinion, it is definitely the wiser option to work with APWireless if you have large-scale projects to engage in.
After working through the process with Ronan, we determined that even if the roof of the building was not troubling us, we would have opted to work with APWireless. In our opinion, a good offer is always a good offer! My advice to other landlords is to look at your contract that currently exists with the mobile operator and to understand that the rent is not a secure income. It is important to consider where your lease will be in five, six or seven years’ time. Will it still be a functionable source of income? It’s impossible to definitively say when dealing with a technology asset, and in my view, a bit of a gamble. If another chairperson or telecoms landlord generally were to call me and mentioned they were relying on the rent, I would refer them back to the contract they have signed because it does normally lie in the mobile operators’ favour.
I would be happy to recommend working with APWireless to other sports clubs in similar positions to us. We didn’t want to put the money into the day to day running of the club, we wanted to invest it back into the infrastructure of the building for the benefit of everyone. Our goal was achieved! I would certainly recommend Ronan as an honest person to work with. He delivered what he said he would deliver. Overall, I had a very positive experience and would certainly work with this company again in the future.
