Commercial real estate lending

SunTrust sold an insurance financing unit that it deemed noncore, but it is on the lookout to buy more complementary businesses such as a CRE lender it acquired last year.

The Trepp CMBS delinquency rate is now 5.18%, a decrease of three basis points from the October level; declines were limited to the industrial, multifamily and office subindexes.

A New York banker who mastered the art of buying low and selling high, broke industry norms and learned from his mistakes in commercial real estate, John Kanas became a model regional bank builder. After stepping down as BankUnited's CEO last year, he wants to do "one more thing" before fully calling it quits.

The delinquency rate for U.S. commercial real estate loans in CMBS is now 5.21%, a decrease of 19 basis points from the September level, according to Trepp. That is the second-largest rate drop measured in the last 19 months.

BOK Financial benefited from rising interest rates in the third quarter even as it reported declines in fee income and commercial real estate loan balances.

The Tennessee bank said it has bought Professional Mortgage in Greenville, S.C., which services about $1.1 billion of commercial mortgage loans for 23 correspondent life company lenders.

A 38% increase in new loan originations led to another quarter of record earnings.

Putting faith in its team of experts analyzing every loan application, the Arkansas bank is shrugging off warnings of a real estate downturn.

In a business populated by extroverts, Diana Reid views herself as an introvert. The head of PNC Real Estate at PNC Financial Services Group says it's an attribute that she's made an asset as she looks to build consensus and drive business growth.

Quaint Oak in Pennsylvania is making a big push in real estate brokerage, a business that many state-chartered banks might think is illegal for them to pursue.

Armada Analytics, a commercial real estate underwriting and asset management services provider, acquired Anabranch Flood, a provider of flood risk assessment services.

Lenders say they are eager to reduce their exposure to CRE, but an examination of recent deals shows just how hard that can be.

Insurers are seeing modest gains in market share as banks, facing increased scrutiny from regulators, lightly tap the brakes.

The FDIC is watching banks that use wholesale funds to support CRE lending. The warning comes as brokered deposit levels at community banks are at their highest level in nearly six years.

New data shows that large commercial banks are increasing their originations of single-family construction loans, but these loans still represent a small percentage of their total assets.

An aggressive band of community, regional and investment banks is stepping into the commercial real estate void left by more cautious lenders, saying there are still good CRE loans to be made or bought.

The trend of putting ever-smaller pieces of the same commercial mortgages into multiple securitizations requires investors to be extra careful, and will inevitably make workouts of bad loans more complicated.

Construction lending could make a comeback if bankers persuade Congress to reform capital and other complicated rules on so-called high volatility CRE loans. But will regulators go for it?

The Trump administration's initial tax plan may be short on details, but a bipartisan bill offers some very specific relief for the commercial real estate industry.

Executives at BB&T, KeyCorp and Citizens are milking commercial lending niches and balancing cost control with new investments while waiting for more rate hikes to fatten margins.