MBA: Commercial and Multifamily Mortgage Debt Outstanding Increased in Second-Quarter 2025
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The level of commercial/multifamily mortgage debt outstanding increased by $47.1 billion (1%) in the second quarter of 2025, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) latest Commercial/Multifamily Mortgage Debt Outstanding quarterly report. Total commercial/multifamily mortgage debt outstanding rose to $4.88 trillion at the end of the second quarter. Multifamily mortgage debt alone increased $27.7 billion (1.3%) to $2.19 trillion from the first quarter of 2025.
“Commercial and multifamily mortgage debt outstanding increased modestly in this year’s second quarter,” said Reggie Booker, MBA’s Associate Vice President of Commercial Research. “Every major capital source added to its holdings, but growth varied, with life insurance companies increasing their holdings by 2.4% and banks by 0.9%.”
The four largest investor groups are: banks and thrifts; federal agency and government sponsored enterprise (GSE) portfolios and mortgage-backed securities (MBS); life insurance companies; and commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS), collateralized debt obligation (CDO) and other asset-backed securities (ABS) issues.
Commercial banks continue to hold the largest share (38%) of commercial/multifamily mortgages at $1.8 trillion. Agency and GSE portfolios and MBS are the second-largest holders of commercial/multifamily mortgages (22%) at $1.08 trillion. Life insurance companies hold $769 billion (16%), and CMBS, CDO and another other ABS issues hold $643 billion (13%). Many life insurance companies, banks and the GSEs purchase and hold CMBS, CDO and other ABS issues. These loans appear in the report in the “CMBS, CDO and other ABS” category.
MBA’s analysis summarizes the holdings of loans or, if the loans are securitized, the form of the security. For example, many life insurance companies invest both in whole loans for which they hold the mortgage note (and which appear in this data under Life Insurance Companies) and in CMBS, CDOs and other ABS for which the security issuers and trustees hold the note (and which appear here under CMBS, CDO and other ABS issues).
MULTIFAMILY MORTGAGE DEBT OUTSTANDING
Looking solely at multifamily mortgages in the second quarter of 2025, agency and GSE portfolios and MBS hold the largest share of total multifamily debt outstanding at $1.08 billion (49%), followed by banks and thrifts with $645 billion (29%), life insurance companies with $256 billion (12%), state and local government with $93 billion (4%), and CMBS, CDO and other ABS issues holding $68 billion (3%).
CHANGES IN COMMERCIAL/MULTIFAMILY MORTGAGE DEBT OUTSTANDING
In the second quarter, life insurance companies saw the largest gains in dollar terms in their holdings of commercial/multifamily mortgage debt – an increase of $17.7 billion (2.4%). Bank and thrifts increased their holdings by $16.3 billion (0.9%), agency and GSE portfolios and MBS increased their holdings by $8.7 billion (0.8%), and REITs increased their holdings by $1.9 billion (2.2%).
In percentage terms, private pension funds saw the largest increase–3%–in their holdings of commercial/multifamily mortgages. Conversely, state and local government retirement funds saw their holdings decrease 1.9%.
CHANGES IN MULTIFAMILY MORTGAGE DEBT OUTSTANDING
The $27.7 billion increase in multifamily mortgage debt outstanding from the first quarter of 2025 represents a quarterly gain of 1.3%. In dollar terms, life insurance companies saw the largest gain – $14.2 billion (5.8%) – in their holdings of multifamily mortgage debt. Agency and GSE portfolios and MBS increased their holdings by $8.7 billion (0.8%), and bank and thrifts increased by $5.5 billion (0.9%).
Life insurance companies saw the largest percentage increase in their holdings of multifamily mortgage debt, up 5.8%. Nonfinancial corporate business saw the largest decline in their holdings of multifamily mortgage debt at 15.5%.
MBA’s analysis is based on data from the Federal Reserve Board’s Financial Accounts of the United States, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s Quarterly Banking Profile, and data from Trepp LLC. More information on this data series is contained in Appendix A.
For more information on this report, click here: https://www.mba.org/news-and-research/research-and-economics/commercial-multifamily-research/commercial-multifamily-mortgage-debt-outstanding-x44535.
