One clear winner so far in the post-Great Recession market are commercial real estate auctioneers.
The dollar volume of CRE properties sold via auction jumped 33% from 2010 through 2011. Auction sales, excluding non-arm's-length foreclosures, jumped from $2.52 billion in 2010 to $3.35 billion, according to data from CoStar COMPs.
It should be noted that these numbers may under-report the amount and volume of auction-based sales activity as there is no efficient process for tracking what process was used in all property transactions. Nor, for example, do the numbers reflect note sales – even when the property was to become REO at the time of sale or shortly thereafter.
