NYC Commercial Real Estate Sales Plunge Over 50% As Owners Lever Up In The Absence Of Buyers

So what do you do when the bubbly market for your exorbitantly priced New York City commercial real estate collapses by over 50% in two years?  Well, you lever up, of course. 

As Bloomberg notes this morning, the 'smart money' at U.S. banking institutions are tripping over themselves to throw money at commercial real estate projects all while 'dumb money' buyers have completely dried up.

A growing chasm between what buyers are willing to pay and what sellers think their properties are worth has put the brakes on deals. In New York City, the largest U.S. market for offices, apartments and other commercial buildings, transactions in the first half of the year tumbled about 50 percent from the same period in 2016, to $15.4 billion, the slowest start since 2012, according to research firm Real Capital Analytics Inc.

At the same time, the market for debt on commercial properties is booming. Investors of all stripes -- from banks and insurance companies to hedge funds and private equity firms -- are plowing into real estate loans as an alternative to lower-yielding bonds. That’s giving building owners another option to cash in if their plans to sell don’t work out.

“Sellers have a number in mind, and the market is not there right now,” said Aaron Appel, a managing director at brokerage Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. who arranges commercial real estate debt. “Owners are pulling out capital” by refinancing loans instead of finding buyers, he said.

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