Landowners should hold their nerve against pressure from the UK's consolidating mobile phone groups to cut rents for antenna sites, a sector expert has said.

Mobile groups have been demanding rent cuts, typically of some 40%, to the �5,000-6,000 a year or more that they pay for their rural mast site, after tie-ups put cost savings on the agenda, chartered surveyor Tom Bodley Scott said.

Besides the full-blown merger of Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile with France Telecom's Orange, O2 and Vodafone have unveiled a deal to share antenna sites. T-Mobile and Hutchison Whampoa's operator, 3, have already made significant progress on site sharing.

However, the operators' position in seeking cost reductions may not be as strong as they are making out, Mr Bodley Scott said.

IPhone factor 

There were "alternative views" to the barrister's opinion that T-Mobile and 3 had used to support their campaign, and which was often based on pursuing claims that landholders were unreasonably dragging their heels in.

And farmers may be wise to call the bluff of operators saying that sites could be excluded if not deal is reached, so threatening rents longer term.

"This may be an issue for landowners if there is a competing site 20 yards away. But if it is 300 yards away, that could be a different story," Mr Bodley Scott, of Batcheller Thacker, told Agrimoney.com.

"With the rise of the iPhone and applications using greater capacity, it is not as if the operators have as much flexibility as might be thought just to cut out masts."

Furthermore, planning constraints could limit development of existing sites, or creation of new ones.

Investor interest 

Indeed, while accepting that duplicate sites may become worthless, "what is clear is that those sites that remain will become more and more important in providing vital capacity and coverage improvements� for those networks that remain", he said, in separate comments.

Indeed, investors were seeing profits in snapping up single mast sites, with deals being struck at rates of some 7-8 times yield.

"This illustrates that, despite the turmoil created by network consolidation, there appear to be investors willing to acquire sites at what appear to be rather strong prices."