Where the rates stand
The overall CMBS delinquency rate was 7.85% in August 2026, down one basis point on the month, according to Trepp's report published September 1. Office loans crossed a threshold, rising nine basis points to 12.00%.
The month's movements were concentrated in two sectors. Lodging delinquency rose 49 basis points to 5.84% and retail 24 basis points to 7.20%. Multifamily was unchanged at 7.69% and industrial rose a single basis point to 1.14%.
July had been the harsher month. The overall rate rose 51 basis points to 7.86%, with multifamily up 46 basis points to 7.69% and office up 34 basis points to 11.91%. Five loans accounted for $2.6 billion of the $6.0 billion of newly delinquent balance — roughly 44% of the month's total from five borrowers.
Special servicing tells a worse story
The overall special servicing rate rose 33 basis points in August to 11.42%, the highest level since February 2013, in a report published September 14. July's rate had fallen 11 basis points to 11.09%.
Mixed-use was the driver, rising 154 basis points to 13.47% on the transfer of a single $1.10 billion loan secured by a Hollywood studio and office complex.
Analysis: the special servicing rate exceeding the delinquency rate by more than three and a half points is the substantive point. Loans move to special servicing when a default is anticipated, not only when payment is missed, so the gap measures distress recognized before it appears in the delinquency series.
A definitional caution
Trepp's headline delinquency rate excludes performing matured balloon loans — borrowers who reached maturity without repaying but continue to make payments. The June report noted that including them would have produced a rate of 9.53% against the headline 7.35%, a difference of 218 basis points.
That is not a small methodological footnote. A loan past its maturity date and still outstanding is in a materially different position from a current loan, and whether it counts as delinquent changes the level of the series by more than two points.
Readers comparing CMBS distress across sources should establish which convention each uses. Bank commercial real estate loan data from bank regulators follow different definitions again, which is why those figures cannot be set directly against CMBS rates.
What it says about the sectors
Office at 12.00% and industrial at 1.14% are the two ends of the commercial market in a single table. That spread of nearly eleven points reflects the divergence between a sector still absorbing the post-2020 change in space demand and one supported by logistics demand.
Multifamily at 7.69% is the figure that connects to housing. Apartment properties financed at 2021 valuations and low rates face refinancing at current rates against rents that have been roughly flat year over year — the arithmetic that produces distress without any operational failure.
The June report recorded the seriously delinquent rate falling to 7.16% from 7.30%, a reminder that the series does not move in one direction. Three months of data through August describe a market where distress is broadly stable in aggregate and still concentrating in specific property types.