The New York Times, July 24, 2024, Real Estate Crisis? Small Banks Say Their Loans Are Fine.
Small banks are feeling misunderstood.
They see themselves as integral to neighborhoods across the country: backers of local dry cleaners, dentists and sandwich shops. Investors worry that those banks could be a crisis waiting to happen.
The pride and the anxiety both reflect the fact that community banks are big lenders in the commercial real-estate market, which has been rocked by falling property values as large office buildings sit empty.
