Bankruptcy filings are a certainty at this point. We are more than six months into the pandemic, and businesses are continuing to lose revenue, leading to rent loss for landlords. However, there is still some debate among industry experts about the amount of bankruptcy filings that will hit the market. Some, like BH Properties and Sabal Capital are expecting waves of bankruptcies, but Uzzi Raanan, a partner at Danning Gill, says that there could be a surge or merely an uptick in bankruptcies.

"It is difficult to predict whether we will see a surge in bankruptcy filings, or merely an uptick," Raanan tells GlobeSt.com. "We are still in the midst of an unprecedented—at least in recent times—pandemic that shuttered or greatly impacted most businesses, significantly increased unemployment, reduced economic activities in multiple sectors, and disrupted operations of the judicial system.  The reasons we have not experienced a deluge of bankruptcies include a large infusion of funds from the federal government through the CARES Act to businesses and the unemployed, as well as various statutes and emergency orders at the federal and local levels that effectively suspended evictions/foreclosures throughout the country."

Government support and aid is only one element. Landlords have also played a significant role in stabilizing the market and working with tenants through challenges and lost revenue during the pandemic. "Many landlords, both commercial and residential, have bent over backwards to work with tenants who allege hardship due to COVID-19," says Raanan. "They have deferred, reduced, and even forgiven rents with the hope that things will be worked out when the pandemic ends."