Buildings, buildings, and more buildings

[Mr. Haunt]

What kind of buildings do you hold your haunt in? Are they near other businesses? Do you own them or lease?

[Jim Warfield]

The Ravens Grin Inn is actually a solidly welded pure titanium structure from the fourth galaxy. I ordered it at Transworld many years ago.
Look REAL close you can see those welds, but they are impervious!
Spilled beer and puke clean right off this surface.

[Hell American Freak]

Ours is actually the hollowed out trunk of an old oak tree on a planet where apes have evolved to the dominant lifeform and man has regressed to nothing more then a speachless slave. All of our actors are wierd skinless freaks that worship an unexploded nuclear weapon and Charlton Heston is our leader. He leads us in nightly revolts against giant man eating snails from planet Volerom Persikol 8.

On a serious note...We are a temporary structure next to a popular retail store in a high traffic area.

[Infoamtek]

And the local National Guard wants their mess tent back.

[Jim Warfield]

They say you can keep the "Mess-Pants".

[Nicole]

Our owner-op has been at this for almost 20 years now... took over a haunt that was in a leased building (non-operating 750 room resort in the sticks - in 2002 it burnt down in the off-season), before that he leased buildings at our state fair grounds for a few years - (many many many additional costs were wrapped up in that - not worth it!), then most recently we had leased a 2-level (medieval-style) banquet/special event building at a local ski resort.

The common theme with all of these locations - short term leases... and all were no more than 3 months or so...

We'd load in tons and tons of crap, get the show built (not alot of time usually), and then tear it down and move it all out. The frustration is the cost of storage, moving and set up - we wnated to do more with our show and be more detailed but could never do it to the level we wanted because we had to move out again.

So after years and years of this we've been on haitus since 2004 - on a quest to find an affordable long-term/permanent home that has a decent location and most of all good atmosphere. It's like finding a needle in a haystack!

I guess I'd say if you're going to lease - consider a long term one - NOT for your first year, but when you get to a point where you know you can afford it... or find some property for purchase, and put up a pole barn/do a facade.

Either way it all takes lots of $$$$

[Duke of Darkness]

To expand the scope of this question just a bit...

While I have been haunting for a very long time, when I did military and charity haunts the buildings were provided. When I built my first pro attraction, it was co-located with another existing haunt. So this year will be my first year actually looking for a building. For those that have obtained temporary leases, what kind of buildings/owners do you look for? Have you found big property management companies willing to work with you? How have you pitched it to make it attractive to the owner/manager of the space?

To me this the most daunting part of opening this year. Any advice appreciated.

Dave

[Jim Warfield]

In the years of reading these and other boards , getting the space to do one's haunt seems to be the biggest hell anyone goes through to make it happen.
Boy, here's an idea, create a web based business, a company that scouts and procures possible haunt locations and makes them available, for a fee, of course. Maybe computer info from realators could co-ordinate such information to come together?

[Kevin Dells]

Buildings are the toughest part.

As far as the bigger building realtys go they most of the time won't answer your call.

Meening when you call them and get a voice mail, dont ever tell them your interested in a building for a haunt, wait until you have them in person. They make very little profit for leasing for only a few months to you if any so their not very cooperative.

We have one guy in our city and his realty has most of the buildings up for lease or sale and he won't even return a call.

[Jim Warfield]

Own all the big buildings in an area and keep the riff-raff out, keep the prices and rents high...it's called "Monopoly" as popularised by Milton and some guy named Bradley.