Scoring Strategy
Ten criteria, zero weights, and no points anywhere in the document
The City lists ten evaluation criteria and assigns no weight to any of them. No points, no scale, no minimum, no cost-versus-technical split, no tie-breaker, and no preference points of any kind. City staff evaluate; an oral interview with one or more firms may follow. The Where it is won column below is Awarded's read, not the City's.
| Criterion | Weight | Where it is won |
|---|
| Quality and completeness of proposal | None | The RFP says a proposal is complete only if it answers all fourteen items. Answer fourteen, in the City's order. |
| Quality of proposed services | None | One of only two criteria won by writing. |
| Team ability and experience, including property management software | None | Name the platform. The City singles software out inside this criterion and never names its own registry. |
| Experience with similar property types | None | Deed-restricted BMR, workforce with preference ladders, and scattered-site single-family are three separate claims. |
| Exceptions to the agreement, insurance, and scope | None | Scored against you. Send economic disagreements to the September 21 questions deadline instead. |
| Proposed fees | None | Seven fee lines, each in the City's stated unit. Separate schedules per package. |
| Additional cost for excluded or separately billed work | None | A second price criterion. Every carve-out costs you twice. |
| Acknowledgement of the business license requirement | None | One sentence. Omitting it is an unforced error. |
| Licenses and registrations in good standing | None | Contractor's license number and DIR registration number, printed. The clearest separator available. |
| Quality of references | None | Three references, municipal where possible. The word "municipal" is the instruction. |
Count the column: eight of ten criteria are satisfied by producing a document, a number, or a license. Two reward narrative. That is an unusual shape, and it tells you where to spend the hours.
Who Should Bid
And who should leave this one alone
Eligibility gates. There are almost none, which is itself notable. No mandatory pre-proposal conference, no portal registration, no bonding, no prequalification. Site tours are encouraged but optional. You need audited financial statements and a most recent annual report, a Foster City business license for the term, and, if you intend to do in-house work above $1,000 or bid the optional project management scope, an active General Contractor's license. Prevailing wage applies to the Workforce package, and firms that commit to registering before contract execution are expressly encouraged to apply.
The right bidder is a California affordable-housing operator that already runs deed-restricted BMR compliance as a normal part of its business, holds an active contractor's license and DIR registration, carries or can afford $5M professional liability, and has enough bench to put a housing representative on site at a 22-unit building. If that is you, the licensing requirements are a moat rather than a hurdle.
The wrong bidder is a conventional fee-per-door manager pricing off unit count. Twenty-eight doors will not carry an eight-tier preference ladder, annual recertifications, four January 1 deliverables, a June 30 registry report, twice-weekly janitorial, and a live-in caretaker at a market per-unit rate. If your model needs 200 doors to work, this contract will lose money politely for 31 months.
The overlooked play is bidding the six EUPP houses alone. They carry none of the prevailing wage, janitorial or caretaker load, and they sit on the City's Housing Element commitment to convert at least one unit to supportive housing by 2031. That is a small contract with a long tail, and the City has already shown it will split this work into separate procurements.
