Man walks into a bar, ends up listing a missile silo

Terra Martin manages a bar in Tescott, KS, called the Lumberyard, but also moonlights—or moondays?—as a real estate agent. Not much happens in this tiny 266-person town, but that changed recently when one of the bar’s regulars walked in complaining that he couldn’t sell his missile silo.

Built in 1960 to store (and, if all hell broke loose, launch) a nuclear-equipped Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile, the Rolling Hills Missile Silo was decommissioned after the Cold War. It fell into the ownership of Paul Novitske, who’d been trying to offload it for months with no luck. Once Martin heard of his struggles, she decided to help him out.

The resulting listing Martin devised leaned heavily on humor, as well as the property’s potential versus its dark past: “Whether you’re planning: The ultimate prepper haven, a secure data center, a luxury underground home, the most insane Airbnb on the planet, a climate-controlled wine cellar, a mushroom farm, an underground art gallery, a high-security collectibles vault, a private bunker party venue, a film location like no other… The possibilities are as endless as the space below your feet. The sky isn’t the limit, because this fortress is underground.”

Here’s what happened when Martin put this unusual property on the market for $1.3 million.

How’d you end up selling this missile silo? “I have been in real estate for about five years and a bar manager for two in a small town close to the silo. The Lumberyard has regulars who come in every single day, just like any other bar. Well, one of our regulars—the seller, Paul Novitske—had listed the property himself without an agent. After a couple of months of trying to do it on his own, he approached me about what my thoughts were on listing it, what plans I would implement for marketing and selling the property, and we immediately got started.”

Did you face many challenges listing this property? “The only challenge I’ve faced is entering it into our MLS [multiple listings service]. There were so many different opinions on how it should be listed, but ultimately, I decided to list it as residential because that is what it is zoned as with our county. Other than that, it’s been smooth sailing and an amazing learning experience.”

What’s it like inside the silo? Have you toured it? “I was inside of it before he even had it listed, and it’s beyond what you could imagine. It’s easily the coolest thing I’ve seen. When you go in, you immediately feel the temperature change once you go down five to 10 steps. The temperature is constantly between 54° and 62°. At the bottom of the stairs, there’s a long hallway with sharp turns because they’re still technically in the ‘blast zone.’ They allow for the debris of an explosion to have somewhere to go without damaging anything. You’ll come to a set of two steel doors, weighing 3,000 tons each. This is called the ‘Entrapment Zone.’ This was so that if someone comes in, they go through the first door, close it behind them, pick up a phone, and say who they are. If they can verify with the camera that they are indeed who they said they are, they will unlock the second door. But if you were lying about who you said you are, they would trap you between the two doors. You’ll then get to the first area of usable space. This area also has an escape hatch: When you open the hatch, two tons of sand drops, you climb the mountain of sand, get to the ladder, and climb out.”

How’s the response been to this property? “Astronomical! The response has been a whole lot of questions and curiosity about the property itself. This is such a unique one that people have flocked to it. We got the property listed on Zillow Gone Wild, and I’m doing an interview at the missile silo this Tuesday with KCTV5. I’m very grateful for the opportunities and exposure that this specific property has given me and my brokerage.”

Who has contacted you to purchase this property? “Out of the people who have reached out in a serious way with intent to purchase, I’ve had people who do crypto, and some families that would want to turn it into a home. But I’d say investors are the ones who are most interested. Most of the families that have reached out are investors already. We have not received any offers yet, but we did have a group give us a letter of intent to purchase. But as of right now, the silo is still active and for sale.”

See more photos of this wild property and its intrepid real estate agent below.