Self-storage: The men who got rich selling empty space

Not to be belabour the point, but in a place like Somalia, gun toting labour is cheap. You'd need two or three "shift supervisors" (overseers who keep the labour in line, really), and you'd pay them more, but overall, the teens with AKs and the tough-as-nails-and-mean-as-hell overseers would likely end up costing less than one pays in taxes.

Now add the cut to the local warlord, who "respects" your area so long as you "respect" his due.

Oh, wait, that's starting to look a lot like taxation, police services, rights enforcement. Just without the actual rule of law, good governance, and an independent judiciary.

Really, I do not understand this notion that police services, etc., are free. We pay for them with every dollar we earn and every dollar we spend.

As the man said, I like paying taxes, with them I buy civilization.

If you have to rent a storage unit get the smallest unit, and get rid of it quick. I used to work for this thieving industry. The owners know once you move your stuff in; they have a customer for life. As you get older you will accumulate some good stuff, but make sure it can all fit in a closet sized unit. Keep tools of your trade. Keep valuable jewelry, and silver. As for books, it's my sore spot--I have a small library. If I needed to part with them, and I just might ave too, I'd keep a valuable first editions, and two milk crates full of must have refrence books. The indusrtry is a slimy business. The owners take advantage of hoarders, sedimental types, and the desperate. They literally have industry seminars where they discuss making more money on late fees. The also ask for your S.S. number when renting(I think that is illegial?). Don't take your frustrations out on the country guy--he's just a low paid worker. If you do plan on skipping out on the highest per square foot rent in the world--get your stuff out before the lock goes on. Use their dumpster and throw 90 percent of your garbage out. Yes--most of you store garbage. Women store to many linens, books, and Chinese made furniture, and the inherited sewing machine(keep the machine, throw away the cabinet). Men store too many redundant tools, or huge tools they never use. Keep the suitcase Tig/stick welder. You don't need three welders. Keep the Snap-on tools, but sell the huge cabinet. Sell all antiques, and give away the cheap furniture including the matress. Everyone seems to cling to there matress? My final thought--sit down and roughly figure out how much your stuff is worth. Figure out how many months if rent will replace your possessions? For 95 percent of you it's a couple of months rent. Good luck. Oh yea, I would like to see all rents due on the first of the month. They prorate on the date you move in. Why--so you will forget to ake you payment, and have to pay a late charge. Forgo the rental insurance. Sue the mini storage in small claims court if they slip up in any fashion( I.e. have video cameras, but don't have the tape of your unit being broken into. As to the mini storage owners--yes--you are extorting people at a very stressful time in their lives; you are just like pawn Shop Owners. When you filthy Lookers are counting your ill gotten gains, keep Sundays open, and drop by a local church--you might hear something interesting.

Do CD's/DVD's not have this value anymore? I could CD's being phased out, but DVD's are still entrenched. Maybe with online streaming (Netflix) DVD's too are going away? I would think this would be a lagging indicator though as I can see many storing their DVD's now that streaming is an option.

I'd be curious where you are getting that narrative from. It differs from what I am familiar with for sure in terms of knowledge of this industry. Not that that's not the play of some REIT's (or what they say they are doing but not really doing) of course but I wonder how many of the locations fall into that category vs. just "after a certain point the money essentially prints itself". Which sounds pretty good. [1]

(What you are saying is typically done though with parking lots in cities for sure for various reasons.)

"and you still have control of a massive chunk of land to boot"

Unless you have land in a particularly valuable location the fact that there is a building on it is going to contradict having someone purchase it for development purposes. It's being used. In other words "nothing to see here move along". And if it was in a super valuable upcoming area that would already be priced into the land cost and might be prohibitive.

I'd also would like to know what the time frame is for something like this to actually happen and how many times it has actually been done. That is, out of the entire self storage industry, how many locations (multi level for example - those larger buildings) have been raised for a higher use (with every tenant thrown out)? And something else built on the land which generates more revenue. Where a comparable piece of empty land was not available?

Of course it might be something that the REIT says marketing wise in order to enhance the appearance of the value of their properties. But to me it seems that the reality of whether that would actually happen (and how often) might be entirely different.

That said any links to this would be nice if you can pass along.

[1] For self storage that I am also familiar with they predictably raise the price every year. And it's not easy to move things out (you need a truck or you need to dispose of something.)

Coincidentally, this is something I have researched just last week for my area. I would love to store boxes upon boxes of things that I will need in another two years (eg. baby clothes), will sell eventually, or plain don't want around[0].

Unfortunately, I have come to the conclusion that the concept of self-storage presented here, quite similar in spirit to my local self-storage providers (henceforth: SSPs), is not reconcilable with my use-cases and fundamental needs.

To wit: All SSPs that I found were located on the outskirts of town. "Industrial estate" would describe it well. This calls for car ownership (or rental, at least) and huge transfer volumes.

But I want to spirit away a smallish box every month or so. I would like to carry it (perhaps in a bicycle trailer) around the corner. In short: I want those SSPs to be as ubiquitous as libraries.

Now, are there cities were a system not unlike to the one outlined above exists? If so, are hacker/maker spaces similarly well-distributed?

[0] Books, chiefly by virtue of their tactility, belong solidly into the latter category, as non-intuitive as it may sound: these cellulose blighters are everywhere and frankly cumbersome to circumnavigate by now.