GASB 87 software for universities and the lease data every platform needs
GASB 87 software for a public university does two jobs: it calculates the lease liability, the lease receivable and the note disclosures, and it holds the contracts behind them. Neither job starts until somebody has read every lease the campus signed, as tenant and as landlord. LeaseAbstracts does that reading. Upload each lease with its amendments and get the term, payments, options, cancellation rights and variable rent as fields linked to the clause they came from, ready to load into DebtBook, LeaseQuery or the lease module of your ERP.
THE PROBLEM
Built for controllers, assistant vice presidents for finance, real estate offices and lease accountants at US public universities, colleges and community college districts reporting under GASB 87
A university signs leases in a dozen places. Athletics rents a practice facility, the medical school rents clinic space, IT leases copiers, the real estate office rents rooftops to wireless carriers and storefronts in the student union to retailers. GASB 87 needs every one of them in the inventory, and each needs a term, a payment stream and a judgment about options that only the signed document answers. At two to four hours per lease by hand, 150 contracts is 300 to 600 hours before the software calculates anything.
Lessee and lessor leases in the same field set
A public university is a tenant and a landlord at once. The AI reads both kinds of contract into the same columns: parties, premises, commencement and expiration, each rent step, abatement, renewal and termination options with their notice dates, and percentage or usage rent. Your accountant sorts the rows into lease liabilities and lease receivables instead of rebuilding two spreadsheets.
The term questions GASB 87 actually asks
The standard turns on who can cancel and who can extend. The abstract returns each option as its own field: whose option it is, the notice window, whether both parties can terminate, and any fiscal funding or non-appropriation clause. Those are the facts behind the lease term and the short-term lease test.
Every value carries its page and clause
Each date and dollar figure links to the sentence that produced it. A reviewer confirms an abstract in minutes, and when the state auditor or the external audit firm samples a lease, the support for the term and the payments is already attached.
A published price that fits a purchasing card
Plans run from $49 a month for 15 leases to $800 a month for 500. There is no demo to schedule and no implementation fee, so the lease inventory can start this week while the accounting platform works its way through procurement.
Which universities report under GASB 87
Public colleges and universities follow the Governmental Accounting Standards Board, so their leases fall under GASB Statement No. 87. Private nonprofit institutions follow FASB and account for leases under ASC 842. The split matters when you shop, because many lease accounting products were built for ASC 842 first and added GASB later, and some never did.
GASB 87 applies to fiscal years beginning after June 15, 2021, the date set when GASB Statement No. 95 postponed the original deadline. For an institution with a June 30 year end, fiscal 2022 was the first year. Most campuses met that deadline with spreadsheets and a one-time inventory. The buying question now is different: how to keep the inventory current as departments sign, amend and cancel contracts, and how to stop rebuilding schedules by hand each year.
If your institution is private, the same lease reading applies but the outputs differ. Our ASC 842 implementation guide covers that side.
GASB 87 software for universities compared
The table lists platforms a university finance office is likely to meet, with what each vendor says about GASB 87 on its own site and whether a price is published. Where a vendor does not name the standard, we say so and suggest you get the answer in writing.
| Platform | GASB 87 on the vendor site | Published price |
|---|---|---|
| DebtBook | Yes. Built for governments; covers GASB 87, GASB 96 and ASC 842. Lessee and lessor | None. Starter (up to 15 agreements, 2 users) and Complete (unlimited, adds AI data entry), both quoted |
| FinQuery LeaseQuery | Yes. Publishes a Southern Illinois University case study covering lessee and lessor leases | None. Request pricing |
| Visual Lease | Yes. Names GASB 87 and GASB 96 | None. Request pricing form |
| Yardi Corom | Yes. Names ASC 842, IFRS 16 and GASB 87 | None. Depends on modules, contact sales |
| Occupier | Yes, in the Lease Accounting add-on | None. Quote; 20 lease minimum per tier |
| Accruent Lucernex | Yes. Names ASC 842, IFRS 16 and GASB 87 | None |
| Black Owl Systems | Not named as supported. Lists ASC 842, IFRS 16 and ASPE | None. Five tiers, all Contact Sales |
| Oracle Lease Accounting | Not named in the Lease Accounting guide | Part of Oracle Fusion licensing |
| LeaseAbstracts | Not an accounting engine. Produces the lease data the platforms above need | $49 to $800 a month |
Two patterns stand out. No GASB 87 platform on this list publishes a rate card, so a real comparison means several sales conversations. And every one of them calculates from data somebody enters. We compare the two names that reach most public-sector shortlists in DebtBook vs LeaseQuery for GASB 87, and the wider field in our GASB 87 lease accounting software comparison.
What GASB 87 software needs from each campus lease
Whatever platform you choose, it asks for the same inputs. The middle column is where the answer sits in the document.
| Input | Where it comes from in the lease | Watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Lease term | Term clause, commencement letter, renewal and termination options | Periods where both parties can cancel are excluded from the term |
| Short-term test | Maximum possible term including every extension option | A one-year lease with annual renewals is often not short-term |
| Fixed payments and steps | Rent schedule, amendments, abatement riders | Free rent months restated by a later amendment |
| Index-based rent | CPI or rate escalation clause | Measured at the index in effect at commencement |
| Usage or sales-based rent | Percentage rent, per-click copier charges, revenue shares | Left out of the liability or receivable and recognized as incurred |
| Purchase and ownership terms | Bargain purchase option, title transfer clause | A contract that transfers ownership is a financed purchase, not a lease |
| Non-lease components | Maintenance, utilities, service bundles | Separated from the lease payment when prices are stated |
| Discount rate basis | Stated interest rate, if any | If none, the institution estimates its incremental borrowing rate |
Dates drive most of these answers. Our critical date extraction page shows how commencement, expiration and every notice deadline come out as separate fields, and renewal option extraction covers the option terms behind the reasonably certain judgment.
Lessor leases are where campuses lose the most time
Most lease accounting conversations assume you are the tenant. A university is often the landlord, and under GASB 87 a lessor records a lease receivable and a deferred inflow of resources for each lease while keeping the building or land on its books. That needs the same reading, from the other side of the table.
- Wireless carrier rooftop and tower leases. Long terms, several five-year renewals at the carrier's option, fixed annual escalators. Whether the renewals count is a judgment the lease language supports or does not.
- Retail and food tenants in the student union. Base rent plus a percentage of sales. The percentage portion stays out of the receivable.
- Ground leases for privately developed housing, hotels or research buildings, often 40 years or longer with rent resets. Our ground lease abstraction page covers the fields these documents carry. Some of these arrangements fall under the public-private partnership standard instead, so confirm scope with your auditor.
- Research park and incubator space, frequently on short terms with mutual cancellation rights that take them out of scope.
- Farmland, parking and easement-like agreements signed years ago by an office that no longer exists.
Lessor files are usually the worst organized, because rent arrives without anyone opening the document. They are also where auditors look, because a missing receivable is a missing asset.
How a university builds the lease inventory
- Collect contracts from every signing office. Purchasing, real estate, athletics, auxiliaries, the health system, IT and the foundation if it is a blended component unit.
- Upload each lease with its amendments. The AI reads the set together, so the term reflects the latest extension and not the original document.
- Review the flagged fields. Each value links to its clause and carries a confidence score. A reviewer checks the uncertain ones instead of re-reading 60 pages.
- Decide scope and term. With every option, cancellation right and payment type in columns, your accountant applies the short-term test, the reasonably certain judgment and the lessee or lessor label across the whole portfolio in one sitting.
- Export and load. Excel or CSV goes into the GASB 87 platform or the ERP lease module. If your ERP is the destination, see our pages on Workday lease accounting data and Oracle Lease Accounting FBDI data.
Southern Illinois University describes forming a seven person team across departments to select its GASB 87 tool for three campuses, according to the case study its vendor published. That is the scale of coordination the inventory takes. The reading does not have to wait for the selection.
What it costs next to the platform quote
None of the GASB 87 platforms above publishes a price, so we cannot tell you what yours will be. What we can show is the cost of the step they all leave to you.
| Campus portfolio | Hours by hand (2 to 4 per lease) | LeaseAbstracts plan |
|---|---|---|
| 15 leases | 30 to 60 hours | $49 a month |
| 75 leases | 150 to 300 hours | $149 a month |
| 250 leases | 500 to 1,000 hours | $399 a month |
| 500 leases | 1,000 to 2,000 hours | $800 a month |
The hour ranges are our arithmetic from the per-lease estimate, not a vendor figure. Plans and limits are on the pricing page. A system office can run several campuses on one plan and cancel when the back catalog is loaded, then keep a small plan for new and amended contracts.
WHAT WE EXTRACT
Every lease term, source-linked
FAQ
Common questions
Do universities have to follow GASB 87?
Public colleges and universities do, because they report under GASB standards. Private nonprofit institutions follow FASB and apply ASC 842 instead. GASB 87 took effect for fiscal years beginning after June 15, 2021, so a public institution with a June 30 year end first applied it in fiscal 2022.
What is the best GASB 87 software for universities?
It depends on what the campus lacks. DebtBook (renamed Monetary in 2026) and FinQuery LeaseQuery are the names most public-sector finance offices shortlist, and Visual Lease, Yardi Corom, Occupier and Accruent Lucernex also name GASB 87. None publishes a price. All of them need the lease data entered first, which is the part abstraction software handles.
Does GASB 87 software read the lease documents?
Mostly no. These platforms calculate schedules, journal entries and disclosures from data that a person keys or imports. Some offer AI-assisted data entry in higher tiers. Ask each vendor which fields it extracts, whether each value links to its clause, and what your staff are expected to enter during setup.
What is a short-term lease under GASB 87?
A lease with a maximum possible term of 12 months or less at commencement, counting every option to extend regardless of how likely it is to be exercised. A one-year lease with four annual renewal options has a maximum possible term of five years, so it is not short-term.
How does a university account for leases where it is the landlord?
As lessor, the university records a lease receivable and a deferred inflow of resources, measured at the present value of the payments it expects to receive over the lease term, and keeps the underlying asset on its books. Rent based on the tenant's sales or usage stays out of the receivable.
Do cancellation clauses shorten the lease term under GASB 87?
Periods in which both the lessee and the lessor can terminate without the other party's permission are cancelable and excluded from the lease term. A fiscal funding or non-appropriation clause affects the term only when it is reasonably certain to be exercised.
How long does it take to abstract a university lease portfolio?
By hand, a skilled analyst needs two to four hours for a commercial lease with amendments, so 150 leases is 300 to 600 hours. AI abstraction returns each lease in minutes, and the remaining work is a reviewer checking flagged fields against the linked clauses.
Can one plan cover several campuses?
Yes. Plans are sized by the number of leases processed each month, not by campus or legal entity. A system office can abstract the leases of every campus on one plan and export one file per institution for its own schedules and note disclosures.
More lease abstraction use cases
GASB 87 software for universities and the lease data every platform needs
Upload a lease, review a source-linked abstract, and export to a spreadsheet you own.