Housing Crisis

Some $1.5 trillion in real-estate mortgages will come due in the next two years - paving the way for a potential financial crisis as higher interest rates push down property values....

... In comments to The Financial Times, Chad Littell, an analyst at a major research firm that tracks commercial real estate, added that prominent players such as HSBC's recent decisions to unload outstanding debts at a loss come as a red flag.

'The fact that banks want to sell loans is coming up in a lot of conversations,' Littell, who works for New York-based CoStar, said Monday in a similar interview.

The finance expert further remarked of what he said is a clear sign of the bank's determination to reduce their exposure to an increasingly unstable market: 'I am hearing more about it than any time in the past decade.'

At the time of writing, HSBC is in the process of pawning off hundreds of millions of dollars worth of held-up commercial real estate loans potentially as a discount, as part of a burgeoning effort to wind down direct lending to property developers - who many say are poised to default come 2025.