Leasing
Negotiating With the GSA
GSA realty specialists identify issues open for discussion.
By Brenda Johnson, CCIM, CPM, and Ted Mahoney |
When it comes to lease negotiations
with the General Services Administration, the federal government’s real estate
division, commercial real estate professionals must be prepared. Offerors –
those who respond to GSA’s solicitations for space – must read solicitation
and lease documents thoroughly and talk with the lease contracting officer or
national broker contractors to clarify any terms and conditions that are uncertain
to them. To
comply with requirements for fairness in competition mandated by the
Competition in Contracting Act of 1984, GSA provides significant detail in the
solicitation concerning the lease acquisition negotiation process.
Offers must be
responsive and address all aspects of the government’s request for lease
proposals or they will not be considered. In order to be responsive, offers
must provide exactly what is requested by the solicitation, in the format
prescribed, when it is required.
Offers also must
be responsible. Most prospective contractors believe that they can be
determined responsible just by bidding on a government solicitation. That is
far from correct. The Federal Acquisition Regulation Subpart 9.104-1
(www.gsa.gov/far) defines the general standards that prospective contractors
must meet. The standards include not only demonstration of financial
responsibility, but also satisfactory past performance, a support organization,
and demonstrated business integrity, just to name a few.
GSA’s
negotiation team
- identifies negotiation issues and objectives and offerors’
probable approach to negotiations;
- assesses the bargaining strengths and weaknesses of each
offeror;
- establishes negotiation priorities, trade-offs, or
concessions;
- determines a negotiation approach and prepares a negotiation
plan; and
- prepares a negotiation agenda prior to the start of
negotiations that gives the offeror an overview of what the government feels is
important.
Issues such as
price, schedule, technical requirements, contract type, and other lease terms
are open to negotiation.The process
is defined in FAR Subpart 15.3.
For more on leasing opportunities with the federal government, read “The
GSA Way” in the March/April 2011 issue of Commercial
Investment Real Estate.