Commercial Real

Sooner or later in the economic recovery, someone had to write the headline that Salomon Inc. put on its new study of commercial real estate:"Commercial Real Estate: Losing Its Stigma?"Salomon's point is that fewer and fewer real estate developers are deadbeats on their mortgages these days, as the improving economy, interest rates that are the industry's lowest since 1968 and restructured loans help more of them keep up with their payments.Of course, the fact that the worst deals have mostly been foreclosed on by now helps, too.The drop in delinquencies on office building mortgages made by insurance companies is especially striking, analysts Margaret M. Alexandre and Alfred M. Capra write.

Frank Simms Dudley Jr., an Eastern Shore real estate broker and property appraiser, died of complications after surgery March 3 at the University of Maryland Medical Center. The former Baltimore resident was 93. Born in Baltimore, he was the son of Frank S. Dudley, a banker, and Edith Shriner, a homemaker. He lived on Roland Avenue and attended Roland Park Country School before graduating from Gilman School in 1939. His studies at the University of Virginia were interrupted by his service in the Navy during World War II. A lieutenant, he commanded a sub chaser and initially patrolled anti-submarine nets off the New York Harbor and later off San Diego and San Francisco.

CHICAGO -- The commercial real estate industry remains consumed by a credit crunch that has made financing for nearly every kind of project difficult if not impossible to obtain.Even a year after the issue began to receive widespread attention, the credit crunch continues to feed discussion at all levels of the industry."Money is the mother's milk of real estate, and it is something that we just don't have right now," said Eugene Carver, president of the American Society of Real Estate Counselors.

The threat of automatic spending cuts by the federal government caused companies to press the pause button on real estate expansion in the Baltimore region during the third quarter, according to analysts. "It reflects the nature of the economic drivers in the region," said Robert Manekin, managing director of Colliers International's Baltimore office. Federal agencies and contractors make up a large percentage of office tenants throughout Central Maryland, and uncertainty about the national budget has caused them to be more cautious about leasing new space, he said.

Commercial real estate, which nearly killed Maryland National Bank and other mid-Atlantic lenders when it collapsed in the late 1980s, is coming back. And while bankers in this area are still shy from being burned on development loans, they find themselves once again attracted to the flame.Signet Banking Corp. is one of those lenders, but this time around the Richmond, Va.-based company is taking an important precaution. The company, whose subsidiary Signet Bank/Maryland is based in Baltimore, has established a new division to make commercial real estate loans, while exposing itself to very little of the risks of default.

Casey & Associates Inc. yesterday named longtime Baltimore real estate executive Robert A. Manekin as its president, a move designed to strengthen the commercial real estate firm's management ranks and competitive position.The appointment of the former Manekin Corp. senior vice president and Julien J. Studley Inc. senior managing director coincides with efforts by several local firms to better compete at a time when large institutions such as pension funds own increasing amounts of real estate.

Although residential real estate markets have struggled, commercial real estate investments have continued to prosper. Proving an army of doomsayers wrong, real estate mutual funds and real estate investment trusts (REITs) have outperformed the Standard & Poor's 500 for seven consecutive years and could be poised to run their winning streak to eight this year. The average mutual fund investing in real estate-related stocks gained about 33 percent in 2006, topped in performance only by emerging-markets funds, according to Lipper Inc. The three-year annualized return of 25 percent and 10-year annualized return of 15 percent also are impressive.

As chaotic as the commercial real estate market is these days, the pre-engagement deal MNC Financial Inc. has with banking titan NationsBank Corp. isn't expected to shake things up much more."

Abraham Rosenthal remembers a time not long ago when he could name virtually all of the nation's real estate investment trusts off the top of his head."

Dianna Wilhelm, a developer based in Annapolis Junction, was elected this month to head the Maryland chapter of NAIOP, the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties. Wilhelm serves as president of Wilhelm Business Enterprises, a development company she owns with her husband, Wayne Wilhelm, that builds warehouses, "flex" structures and office buildings. The couple also runs Wilhelm Commercial Builders, a 110-employee commercial construction company that specializes in high-security office buildings.

Mary Suzanne Beck Keech, a corporate managing director of Studley Inc., a Washington commercial real estate firm, who was also an active alumna of Garrison Forest School, died of cancer Monday at Georgetown University Hospital. The former Catonsville resident had celebrated her 46th birthday last month. The daughter of Rea Keech, a former Buick automobile dealer, and Mary Keech, a Talbots Cross Keys sales associate, Mary Suzanne Beck Keech was born in Baltimore and raised in Catonsville.

This month, the Baltimore office of Ballard Spahr LLP closed a $460 million real estate deal — the largest U.S. sale of multifamily dwellings outside New York in the past three years, according to commercial real estate industry players. The deal was a coup for the office, which represented the buyer of eight apartment complexes in Maryland and Northern Virginia that contain more than 2,500 units. Marci Gordon, the partner who led Ballard Spahr's team of lawyers during the seven-month negotiation, said the acquisition of the apartment buildings, known as the Magazine Portfolio, by a joint venture of Pantzer Properties and Dune Real Estate Partners showed the strength of rental properties, which have benefited from the continuing slump in the for-sale housing market.

Milton H. "Mickey" Miller, 80, a retired commercial real estate broker and civic leader who ran a successful fundraising campaign for the Peabody Institute, died of congestive heart failure Nov. 12 at Sinai Hospital. The Pikesville resident was 80. Born in Baltimore, he was the son of J. Jefferson Miller, the Hecht department store executive who led downtown Baltimore's urban renewal development in the Charles Center. He was a 1948 Friends School graduate and earned a history degree at the Johns Hopkins University.

Mercy Medical Center is converting a former Giant grocery store in Lutherville into a hub where patients can go for lab work, minor surgeries and to visit primary care physicians. Urgent care centers such as Patient First and Doctors Express are taking over retail spaces in high-traffic areas, including where a Roy Rogers fast-food restaurant was once located. And Thomson Reuters this summer opened its first branch dedicated to health care research in Woodlawn office space, where more than two dozen employees will provide data and analysis to the federal government.