NEWTOWN SQUARE, PA-The US Department of the Army has appointed locally based GMH Communities Trust to provide property management and maintenance services for military family housing. The firm's military housing division will provide services at Carlisle Barracks in Carlisle and Picatinny Arsenal in Dover, NJ.

The agreement includes a 50-year ground lease for the purpose of owning and managing the housing inventory at the two locations. There are currently 316 family housing units at Carlisle Barracks and 113 at Picatinny Arsenal. A GMH spokeswoman declined to disclose the value of the management fees GMH will receive.

GMH is negotiating with a third-party lender to finance construction of new units and the renovation and demolition of some of the existing housing units at both locations. Subject to completion of the financing, this calls for an aggregate of 348 completed housing units at the two installations within a five-year initial development period.

"We look forward to completing the financing and beginning the process of improving the housing," says Bruce Robinson, president of GMH's military housing division, in a statement. The spokeswoman tells GlobeSt.com that GMH expects to close on this part of the agreement during the third quarter and declines to quantify the financing being sought.

The agreement falls under the 1996 Military Housing Privatization Initiative, which allows the Department of Defense and the Department of the Army to work with the private sector to upgrade, operate and maintain military family housing. The housing units are typically leveraged with private investment. Through joint ventures with the Departments of the Army and Navy, GMH currently provides management and maintenance at 19 military installations throughout the US.