A ground lease is an arrangement where the tenant pays a lease rate for the ground and builds the building. These are generally structured on 20-year leases with multiple 5 or 10-year options. Because the tenant invests in building the building, they tend to be viewed as much more secure than typical building leases where the tenant has minimal investment.
You can find them everywhere. Many times, they are marketed as NNN leases, or NNN land leases, or NNN ground leases. Stick that in Google - you'll be busy for a month or more.
Major brokerage houses have entire departments that specialize in the marketing of ground lease properties; Marcus Millichap; NNN Properties, NAI Global, and the regular cast of majors (CBRE, etc.).
What to look for when purchasing? Tenant Quality; Corporate Guarentees; Expiration and kick-out clauses; escalation clauses in the lease so it doesn't go upside down or stay level through an inflationary period. The most important is the relationship of what the lease is being marketed at (price) versus the underlying value of the land and building if the tenant defaults.
We have a few available in New Jersey; you can contact me at amgraziano@nai-atlantic.com.
Oct 6, 2009