After nearly two year’s of quarterly contraction, the size of the nation’s collective commercial mortgage portfolio expanded. Behind the growth were agency holdings and an increase in assets at life insurers.
The last time that the country’s commercial real estate loan portfolio grew was in the third-quarter 2009.
But that changed in the second-quarter of this year.
According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, $2.3734 trillion in U.S. CRE loans were outstanding as of the second quarter.
The total grew from $2.3699 trillion in the first quarter.
But the portfolio has plummeted from the second-quarter 2010, when $3.2442 trillion in commercial mortgages were in place. MBA noted in the latest report, however, that it made improvements to the reported level of outstanding mortgages secured by income-producing properties in the fourth quarter of last year.
A big part of the latest quarter-over-quarter improvement was the result of a $4.429 billion increase in multifamily mortgages held by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Also contributing to the increase were life insurance companies, where CRE assets climbed $4.413 billion. In addition, real estate investment trusts boosted their holdings by $2.496 billion.
But finance company CRE loans fell by $2.900 billion to $58.085 trillion in the second quarter.
Banks and thrifts cut their holdings by $2.581 billion from the first quarter to end the latest period at $0.7916 trillion.
Securitized commercial mortgages fell to $0.6165 trillion from $0.617.9 trillion.
