I have looked at a lot of different hangar space lease agreements at several airports. Mostl have a clause that says only airplanes and other aviation related storage. Then when you walk down hangar row you see campers, boats, hot rods and other cool stuff along with an airplane. Do they just have this verbiage in the lease to make the FAA happy and tell you with a wink that it is enforced.

What airports actually enforce this. Oregon is pretty loose. They can get picky in Northern California but not too bad in Siskiyou County. What is Idaho like.

Depends if the airport accepts federal grant money. If so then there will be some sort of clause stating that, however the FAA is pretty lenient as long as an aircraft is able to move in and out freely. It’s the airport who makes it more strict I.e. no gas cans, no fuel tanks, no boats, no vehicles, campers, no maintenance other than owner preventative maintenance etc etc.

Most airports say they don’t allow boats and vehicles but a lot of lease holders do it with a blind eye by the airport manager, until there’s a complaint. Also be careful doing that, especially if the hangars are full and people are waiting in line, all it takes is some impatient guy waiting for a hangar to tell the airport manager that he sees that you have a boat or car in the hangar and the lease is in violation, they could kick you out immediately especially if they are buddies.

For that, I’m very careful and follow their guidelines even though the other tenants don’t, no boat or my classic car nor any fuel tanks full of avgas. Pain in the ass, but if I get kicked out there’s no place to put my plane reasonable distance. Also There’s a long line here and I’m not originally from here “ain’t from round here”. So the bubba system is not to my advantage in this case.

If they do a hangar inspection, and they have, they have nothing on me. I raised hell on that too because they allowed a person without the proper authority to go into my hangar without informing me. I have hidden cameras.

There was a guy at the O46 (Weed Ca) that had four of five Corvairs in his own hangar on leased ground. No plane. The made him sell the hangar. At same airport a guy had a boat under the wing of his plane and another guy had several kayaks behind his plane and they looked away.

At my airport in colorado, they are generally okay with non-aviation stuff, so long as there is a plane in there. But legally I think the agreement says aviation things only.

Any airport that takes federal monies is required to place those kinds of covenants on hangars, whether leased from the airport, or owned, but built on lease lots.

In Minnesota, there was a wait list for leased hangars. One guy leased three hangars, which were full of all kinds of automotive, aircraft and who knows what else parts. No airplanes, or anything else that would actually move under it's own power.

The airport commission voted to tell him he could keep his hangar leases ONLY if each hangar had at least one airworthy airplane. He cleaned all three hangars out and left. He was using these hangars as an inexpensive "mini Storage". The lease fees at this airport were very reasonable.

The point was, the airport didn't care if he had other stuff in his leased hangars, but they were airplane storage facilities, not junk storage.

And, technically, the FAA CAN require an airport to pay back any funds they've received in past if the airport is found to be in violation of these requirements. I doubt that's ever been carried out, but.....

MTV

Delete

FWIW

https://www.faa.gov/airports/airport_co ... angar_use/

hotrod180 wrote:FWIW

https://www.faa.gov/airports/airport_co ... angar_use/

9. What uses are not permissible under the policy?
Uses not permitted include:

use as a residence;
operation of a non-aeronautical business, e.g., limo service, car and motorcycle storage, storage of inventory, and non-aeronautical business office;
activities that impede the movement of the aircraft in and out of the hangar or other aeronautical contents of the hangar;
activities that displace the aeronautical contents of the hangar or impede access to aircraft or other aeronautical contents of the hangar;
storage of household items that could be stored in commercial storage facilities;
long-term storage of derelict aircraft and parts;
storage of items or activities prohibited by local or state law;
storage of fuel and other dangerous and Hazmat materials; or
storage of inventory or equipment supporting a municipal agency function unrelated to the aeronautical use.

I rent my hangar from the county at a municipal airport. (KCCR, Concord, CA) There's a 24 page rental agreement that was negotiated between a group of the existing tenants and the county around 2003. It's about what you would expect from a county government with a million people population.

As a direct result of that 2003 negotiation the "permitted uses" include:

1. homebuilding, restoration and/or maintenance of the renters aircraft
2. storage of materials related to maintenance and construction of aircraft
3. "storage of one boat, or one recreational vehicle, or one motorcycle, or one automobile..."
4. "storage of comfort items such as a couch, small refrigerator, etc"

There have been periodic inspections that have been cordial and brief, mostly to see that the primary use is for storage of YOUR airplane and there isn't so much crap that it impedes the use of the aircraft or access for firefighting. No big piles of combustibles or barrels of oil, pet elephants, etc

cheers,

Pete

c170pete wrote:I rent my hangar from the county at a municipal airport. (KCCR, Concord, CA) There's a 24 page rental agreement that was negotiated between a group of the existing tenants and the county around 2003. It's about what you would expect from a county government with a million people population.

As a direct result of that 2003 negotiation the "permitted uses" include:

1. homebuilding, restoration and/or maintenance of the renters aircraft
2. storage of materials related to maintenance and construction of aircraft
3. "storage of one boat, or one recreational vehicle, or one motorcycle, or one automobile..."
4. "storage of comfort items such as a couch, small refrigerator, etc"

There have been periodic inspections that have been cordial and brief, mostly to see that the primary use is for storage of YOUR airplane and there isn't so much crap that it impedes the use of the aircraft or access for firefighting. No big piles of combustibles or barrels of oil, pet elephants, etc

cheers,

Pete

Now that make too much sence

We have similar language in our rental agreement, can only be an airplane and aviation related equipment for completing up to owner maintenance. I have a 100 gallon fuel tank on a trailer that I used to use to get mogas for my plane. This is on a Class C airfield with a very established FBO.

I had a hangar inspection once and was given a time period to remove my "non-aviation items," until I explained the use of the fuel trailer. Since they didn't sell mogas they couldn't keep me from using it. I haven't had an issue in the 2 years since.

I have to say that although my local FBO caters to the Cirrus/Baron/Citation crowd, they've been pretty good to me.

It sure would be nice to be on a more municipal field or grass strip though.

CamTom12 wrote:
It sure would be nice to be on a more municipal field or grass strip though.

The smaller the better. There is quite a difference in paperwork required to build a hangar in Nampa and to build one in Payette. My existing situation is the best. Grass strip on my ranch with an agg building that an airplane fits into nicely

It's been quite awhile since I looked at my lease from the airport, but I recall only some ambiguous general terminology that essentially said that the primary use had to be for my airplane. So my airplane fits in, along with a lot of old files from my office and a buddy's files from when he closed his office, some office furniture, a junk trailer, a cabinet with airplane stuff in it, a couple of bicycles, a snow thrower, the electric tug for the airplane, etc. The only gas I store is a gallon can for the snow thrower.

Inspections have always been brief and cordial. My understanding is that others also have miscellaneous non-aviation stuff in their hangars, but I'm not aware of anyone who doesn't have an airplane in theirs.

It seems to me that as long as the airplane is being stored there, and there's room for other stuff without impeding the airplane, then there shouldn't be much to complain about.

Cary

In south west Idaho I did some checking. Nampa airport is typical. Every airport I checked with said as long as you have a plane in the hangar you can have other stuff. Storage of fuel is a no no