What are the prospects for lending to commercial property?

In a plausible central scenario, the amount of debt that banks make available to the commercial property market will fall by more than two-thirds, from a total of over £300bn between 2003 and 2007 to a total of just £100bn or so between 2008 and 2012. This will clearly mean that the playing field will be left much more open to those investors who predominantly use equity to finance property acquisitions, while leaving debt-reliant investors out in the cold. A scarcity of debt-finance will clearly also contribute to continued falls in commercial property prices.