The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) projects total commercial and multifamily mortgage borrowing and lending will decline to $654 billion this year, representing a 20 percent decrease ($816 billion) from 2022.
The MBA offered the declaration during its 2023 Commercial / Multifamily Finance Servicing & Technology Conference in Chicago, indicating multifamily lending alone is expected to fall to $375 billion in 2023 – a 14 percent decline from last year’s expected total of $437 billion.
According to the MBA, borrowing and lending is expected to rebound in 2024 to $829 billion in total commercial real estate lending.
“Higher interest rates, uncertainty about property values, and questions about the outlook for the cash flows of some properties led to a slowdown in commercial real estate transactions and financing beginning in the middle of 2022,” MBA’s Head of Commercial Real Estate Research Jamie Woodwell said. “That slowdown is likely to persist through much of this year as investors, lenders, and others look for greater transparency into the markets. We expect maturing loans to begin to break the logjam and provide greater clarity as this year goes on. However, it may take until 2025 for volumes to get back to previous years’ levels.”
Per the MBA, the organizations forecast of key commercial and multifamily real estate finance indicators includes mortgage maturity volumes, mortgage bankers originations, total multifamily lending, mortgage debt outstanding and multifamily mortgage debt outstanding.