That cabin is amazing! I've always played with the idea of building something on top of an empty silo I have. Spiral stare case to the top of a watch/sniper tower perhaps but that thing is the shit, bit out of my price range though.
Prices for raw stripped sites like that without homes built above them are not all that expensive, relatively speaking of course, as i relation to an average or nicer family home. The problem is almost everything is toxic. Everything that is insulated is insulated with asbestos. The cleaning liquids that were used on the missiles are deadly toxic. Almost everything had PCBs in it ... including the oil and grease that was used on door hinges. The switched for the launch control equipment were mercury switches and when the units were decommissioned and dismantled it was not done with tender loving care so there was mercury spilled all over the place. Some had the blast doors sold for salvage and the LCC, the launch control center, flooded and while they can be pumped out the metal stairs, and everything else metal, has rusted or corroded and would need to be totally replaced. Some silos were left open and they are filled or partially filled with water. One unit in Texas is used for scuba diving, people pay to dive in the nearly 200 feet deep water-filled silo. One with a flooded silo in Arizona sells the water to local farmers for irrigation.
Depending under what treaty a missile site was decommissioned under can make all the difference in the world. The Titan II sites had to have the silo doors removed and buried on site and the silos destroyed, imploded. PCBs and other toxins were used in making the hardened concrete they was used. The ties were then covered with fresh clean soil but by law you cannot dig on the property at all .. not enough to plant bushes ... as of they would live in such toxic conditions. They all had wells, but most are highly contaminated and you cannot, by law, drill a new well and even if close enough to a local town/city water supply they cannot dig on the property to run water to the unit.
One Atlas-E site that was for sale was taken off the market when it was discovered that it's polluted well was spreading towards the water supply of two nearby towns and no one would purchase it because the owner would be liable for damages when the town's water supplies become unsafe.
Only a handful are safe and they have price tags that are more than just very high. We're talking several million for the more reasonably priced ones, and they are already built to how someone else wanted them to be so if that is not what someone wanted their to be, then they would have to pay to rip things out and rebuild and that would way up the final cost. That is what stopped me from purchasing one.
A better, or at least a more reasonable option, is one of the old AT&T "Long Line" hardened communications bunkers that are for sale. They are not very deep underground, like 4 to 8 feet roughly, but they were build with extremely thick hardened concrete and they were 'wrapped' in layers of steel and lead to protect the electronics inside from the EMP of a nuclear blast. They have heavy hardened blast doors so they are also very secure.
Most are rather large, like 10,000 to 15,000 square feet, or larger. The smallest one I found was in Pulaksi Indiana and it is 6,500 sq. ft. In that they were designed to maintain nationwide communications in the event of a nuclear war they are spread out all over the country, some near highly populated areas and others in the middle of nowhere. There is one in Nevada that has, or if sold by now had, a very reasonable price. It was at the end of a long road leading up a mountain and is next to a real true old west ghost town that had once been a stagecoach stop where fresh horses would be available and passengers could get something to eat. The main drawback of that site was the road is not plowed in the winter and at the altitude it is at you would be snowed in for many months.
I contacted AT&T to ask if there were many left to be sold and where they were located. I hoped to be sent a list and if one would be in a location I would be interested in I would purchase it. I was told that there are many left but they are only being put up for sale a few at a time to keep the prices up, the old supply and demand thing, and that the order in which they will be sold has already been decided and I could not pick and choose. I also asked if I could pick one if I could purchase it directly from AT&T to cut out a Realtors commission and was told no ... AT&T turns them over to local Realtors and I would have to go through them and pay the extra.
I had a hell of a dream but it died an ugly death.
There is one of the massive Titan 1 sites, like the one I mentioned in Colorado, that is not far from Sturgis South Dakota that has an amazingly low price-tag, or at least it did when I inquired about it. What I found was it was not sealed after being decommissioned and there is no less than eight feet of water in it, more in some areas like silos, and with the toxins in the water it cannot simply be pumped out. It would have to be pumped into taker trucks and then taken to a toxic waste facility. That would be extremely expensive. Then someone would have to pay for the ecological cleanup inside before any rebuilding of rusted/damaged things could be done so only then a home could be built in it. That is why the initial asking price was so low.
There is a Titan 2 site in Arkansas, one where you cannot even plant bushes or drill a well or have city/town water brought in, that is being advertised as possibly containing a treasure of salvageable materials that might not only be enough to pay for the tie but any building that would be done. I contacted the Air Force, these were all Air Force missile bases, and they told me the name and address and telephone number of the firm that did the salvage work on that particular base. The firm is in Minnesota and the son of the man who ran it at the time now runs the company. He was a teen when that particular base was decommissioned and he said he remembers it well. I asked about what might be left that could be salvaged. The site selling it claims entire control board systems were left in place. I was told that if there is so much as one single piece of wire left that is as much as three feet long he remaining in the underground unit he would be surprised. He said they took everything but the dust.
What makes the sites advertising very deceitful is the entrance to the LCC, the launch control center, was, like everything else, buried. The EPA will not allow any digging on the site, not even to uncover the entrance. So the seller is advertising something like a possible pirate treasure, that does not exist, and says you only have to dig and uncover the entrance to get to it, but under Federal Law you cannot dig to find and then uncover the entrance.
What it comes down to is if someone wants something like an old missile site they will have to have very deep pockets to be able to either pay for one that has been totally redone or to be able to turn a toxic site into something safe ... or go with one of the AT&T "Long Line" hardened communications bunkers.
I still want one but my hopes have dimmed greatly.
