‘Slow-Moving Train Wreck’: There’s A Powder Keg Inside The American Economy — And It Might Blow Up

The commercial real estate sector is facing the possibility of a substantial number of bankruptcies that could ultimately hamper economic recovery and threaten the wounded banking industry, according to experts who spoke to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Overall 30 day+ delinquencies on commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS), meaning the number of borrowers for commercial properties that failed to make a required payment in at least the last 30 days, increased from 2.96% from one year ago to 4.63% as of October, according to a report from market research group Trepp. The delinquencies are indicative of danger in the commercial real estate sector, as they indicate that many of those could become bankruptcies, threatening an already hurting banking industry and exacerbating any economic downturn, according to experts who spoke to the DCNF.

“Commercial real estate is in deep trouble and could constitute a major risk to the banking system and the recovery,” Desmond Lachman, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told the DCNF. “In fact, I would characterize the situation as a slow-moving train wreck. The underlying problem is that occupancy rates have slumped post-Covid since many workers are now working at least part of the time from home.”

Vacancy rates for offices have continued to trend up since the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced many businesses to adopt remote work to continue operations — a change many workers have been reluctant to let go of, according to a report from Cushman & Wakefield. In 2019, the vacancy rate hovered around 13% and has increased to around 20% as of the third quarter of 2023.

“The pandemic was an aggravating force that gave the shift from brick-and-mortar to laptop purchasing critical mass 20 years after it began,” Peter Earle, an economist at the American Institute for Economic Research, told the DCNF. “People, even (and especially) those who were suspicious of internet retail or liked the in-person shopping experience, were forced to move their consumption online during lockdowns and under stay-at-home orders. Many of them liked it, came to trust it, and now see little reason to go back to physical establishments.”

More