A wealth building strategy that is not so commonly known is buying the office buildings where Post Offices routinely take residence, and leasing it to them. These buildings, depending on their size, may sell from anywhere between $60,000 to $200,000 or more and generate discretionary income in excess of $600/month.

While this practice is more prevalent in UK than in US (especially with Post Office licenses now being made available for franchisees in UK!), US residents can still own the buildings and lease them to Post Offices for a steady rental income.

Information on the Internet about this is sketchy, with this 1981 article from NYTimes being the most expansive:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940CE1DD1E38F936A35754C0A967948260

The main advantage of having Post Office as a tenant is the assuredness of receiving your rent on the first of the month unfailingly, and long term contracts which assures your income stream.

The downsides are:

1. Low Value of Rents and Long Term Contracts that prevents rent revisions
2. Cannot Remove Tenant without going to a Federal arbiter
3. Without proper maintenance-contracts in place, costs can become prohibitive

However, once you become familiar with these limitations and put enough safeguards around it, including a plan for what to do when contracts come up for renewals, you can settle into a nice income stream from this source.

There are individuals who are said to own from 10 to 200 post-office buildings.

Tom Phelan (speaker on Self-Directed IRAs) talks about this topic as well at:

http://www.earlytorise.com/_pages/_daily-archives/042006/04252006.php http://www.irachoices.com/

We have not yet personally met individuals who own and lease post-office buildings. If anyone knows such a person, and could put us in touch with them, we will try to produce a complete report on this strategy - including buying/selling strategies and pitfalls, and other maintenance issues and other red flags one must remain aware of.