Trends suggest, however, that the default rates on commercial loans are going to increase significantly, primarily in the hospitality, retail and office sectors. That's one reason that Grubb & Ellis and other real estate services companies, as well as law firms and other professionals who serve the industry, have been gearing up to provide services for financial institutions and other clients who are likely to face problems with troubled assets.

The Grubb & Ellis financial services asset management practice, for example, will provide help with workouts, foreclosures, restructurings, asset management and dispositions for clients ranging from owners to small community banks to the largest institutions and servicers. Andersen says that one of the differences between this downturn and the previous one is that this time around, many of the problem assets are off-balance-sheet deals and CMBS loans that are subject to servicing agreements. In years past, he explains, the troubled assets were portfolio loans by banks that "had the unilateral right to work with the borrower in lieu of foreclosure."

This time around, however, a large proportion of the loans will not be portfolio loans but will be CMBS loans subject to special servicer agreements. The job of sorting out those agreements and the assets that are linked to them will fall to commercial real estate services companies and allied firms that provide the array of services required to identify, value and dispose of troubled assets.