Commercial mortgage production shot up more than a third last year at MetLife Inc. But the life insurer lagged the overall industry in new volume.
The origination of commercial real estate loans exceeded $11 billion during 2011 at the New York-based company.
Loan amounts ranged from $200 million to $350 million. Properties located in Chicago, Denver and New York as well as San Francisco were among those financed.
Commercial mortgage production leapt from 2010, when MetLife funded $8 billion.
MetLife reported that $40 billion in commercial mortgages were in its investment portfolio as of Dec. 31, 2011. The year-earlier figure was $38 billion.
“Our commitment to prudent risk management and our long-term investment approach has allowed us to take advantage of attractive opportunities in the U.S. and internationally, and we will continue to focus on top quality properties in major markets in 2012” Robert Merck, global head of real estate investments for MetLife, said in the report.
While MetLife’s performance was a nice year-over-year improvement, overall industry CRE originations climbed 64 percent between 2010 and 2010, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association — which separately reported that the industry generated $197 billion in total 2011 commercial mortgage originations.
In 2010, MBA ranked MetLife as the biggest life insurer originator of CRE Loans and the sixth-biggest overall CRE lender.
