WASHINGTON, DC—It should business as usual for the commercial real estate capital markets in 2016, according to the CRE Finance Council's annual survey of its members. They are sanguine about the Federal Reserve Bank's decision to raise interest rates. They see underwriting standards as largely remaining unchanged, with lenders focusing on existing rent rolls, then rolling into higher market rents. Only 2% of the respondents cited pro forma underwriting, CREFC CEO Steve Renna tells GlobeSt.com. CMBS originations are expected to be in the range of $100 billion to $125 billion.

Best of all, capital should remain plentiful -- certainly more than enough to meet the once-dreaded wave of debt maturities that are coming due from the halcyon days a decade ago.

More than a majority, or 65% of survey respondents, expect new CMBS issuance in 2016 to be in the range of $100 billion to $125 billion. In addition, 60% of survey respondents believe that anywhere from 75% to 100% of the CMBS loans maturing in 2016 to pay off or refinance.

Respondents also see other capital sources stepping up their CRE allocations. For instance, 66% of survey respondents expect a higher level of loan originations from balance sheet lenders this year and 76% predict that nonbank or private capital sources will originate more loans this year, compared to last. The majority of survey respondents expect foreign investment in both CRE debt and equity to increase.

"Across the board, I think that 2016 will be a favorable one like 2015," Renna says. "There will be ample credit and capital. And the real estate fundamentals are looking like they are strengthening from a market place standpoint."

There are signs in the survey of concern. Marketplaces have a tendency to unexpectedly bite -- witness August 2015. Perhaps with those events in mind, an overwhelming 98% of survey respondents expect CMBS spreads to be somewhat or very volatile this year, due geopolitical and other larger economic concerns.

Regulatory concerns are another unknown, especially in the global arena. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision was expected to publish a rule change for banks' fixed income trading books (FRTB) in December. Now it is expected to publish it at the end of January, leaving the market in suspense about whether it will pull the trigger on the worse case scenario, effectively causing the secondary market-makers in the CMBS ecosystem to radically retrench.

Also, the risk retention requirement for CMBS, mandated under Dodd-Frank, goes into effect at the end of the year but for all practical intents originators will begin complying with it by mid-June.

The B piece buyers, on whom this requirement mainly falls, are positioning themselves for this date but they are not revealing exactly how they plan to address this requirement, Renna said. The best guess is that B piece buyers will want better credit and will be willing to pay for it in terms of better spreads, he said.

"But that will make CMBS more expensive and harder for certain borrowers and deals to get," he said.

So far, though, respondents seem to be sanguine about these developments too. When asked how regulatory developments were effecting competitiveness, 41.3% said "about the same", while 27.5% said it made them less competitive and 31.3% said it made them more competitive.