U.S. Government Hits Pause on Massive Commercial Real-Estate Sale [View all]

Source: msn/WSJ

11h


The U.S. government on Tuesday was gearing up for one of the largest sales ever of commercial real estate. By Wednesday morning, that sales process was suddenly in limbo. In an extraordinary reversal, the General Services Administration removed from its website about 440 federal buildings representing nearly 80 million square feet of space that only hours earlier it had listed for sale.

That followed stinging criticism from workers in the buildings, elected officials and others opposed to the mass property sale that led the GSA to pause. A spokesman for the GSA, which manages federal real estate, said a list of specific properties for sale will be republished in the near future “after we evaluate this initial input and determine how we can make it easier for stakeholders to understand the nuances of the assets listed.”

The Trump administration has been aiming to sell scores of federal buildings throughout the country as part of President Trump’s effort to shrink the government and slash federal spending. While many of the properties are aging, shabby buildings that wouldn’t fetch much, some better-known properties were also up for sale. The list that the GSA made public on Tuesday included the Washington, D.C., headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Labor Department.

But later Tuesday, the GSA reduced the list to 330 properties and removed many of the higher-profile buildings. On Wednesday morning, the GSA website no longer listed any properties. It said that the list of “non-core properties for disposal” was “coming soon”

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/real-estate/u-s-government-hits-pause-on-massive-commercial-real-estate-sale/ar-AA1AkmbN