Lessons Learned About Evaluation of Federal Asset Sale Proposals

GAO discussed important considerations regarding the evaluation of federal asset sale proposals. GAO found that the government should: (1) generally receive fair market value when it sells, exchanges, or leases assets; (2) account for the timing of payments it will receive and the tax implications of a proposed sale in calculating fiscal implications; (3) compare the government's expected value from selling an asset with its expected value from retaining it; and (4) perform sensitivity analyses because of inherent uncertainty in estimating future cash flows that serve as the basis for asset valuation.