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Well, I was re-elected to another two-year term to serve on the board of governors of the Commercial Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization (C-MISMO), on which I have served since 2008.

What’s new this year: I was elected chairman of the board, succeeding Jim Cooke who held that position admirably. As I look forward to two upcoming conferences, I am excited to get C-MISMO moving on existing and new standards.

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The big annual CMBS conference was held last week in Washington, DC — and the mood was cautious.

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Sausalito, CA (May 17, 2012) – A CMBS.com Pro account brings the power of Web-based enterprise software and data to all commercial real estate professionals — at prices as low as $20 per month, without the hassles of spreadsheets, desktop software or expensive data services.

CMBS.com Pro comes from the same team that revolutionized the commercial real estate lending industry with Backshop enterprise software. Backshop enables major players to run their entire CRE businesses in a holistic, flexible and secure Web-based environment by integrating direct cap and DCF lease-by-lease underwriting tools into a pipeline management and report writing application.

CMBS.com Pro is powered by Backshop and offers three packages to serve all commercial real estate players. Services range from $20 per month to $80 per month and deliver powerful capabilities including:

• Never again rely on spreadsheets and other desktop software.
• Access CMBS data at never-before-seen prices.
• Manage your deal pipeline and maximize productivity.
• Value collateral using direct capitalization and discounted cash flow methods.
• Model debt and equity returns.
• Compare your deal to properties that have CMBS debt.
• Quickly write and publish reports.
• Store and manage documents and contacts easily and securely.
• Standardize your deals in the industry-accepted format.
• Serve up to 10 users at any of your locations.

Bringing power to everyone
“We are excited to bring CMBS.com Pro to the commercial real estate community at large,” said CMBS.com and Backshop CEO Jim Flaherty. “The existing deal modeling tools and data services available to the small companies and individual users are based on old technology and priced to support old business models. Having solved these same problems for enterprise clients for years, we are proud to offer commercial real estate players of all types and sizes the same power used by the big guys at never-before-seen pricing.”

Flaherty says a CMBS.com Pro account is perfect for a wide range of CRE players:

• CRE professionals who need a pipeline/document system or work with any types of deals, debt or equity
• Owners, brokers and appraisers who need to model and present valuation scenarios or want info on CMBS comps
• Existing CMBS borrowers who need to manage reporting or want loan comps for their CMBS debt
• Anyone who currently uses Excel or Argus™ to model deals. CMBS.com delivers more power, costs less and eliminates the hassles of spreadsheets and desktop software.

To learn more about a CMBS.com Pro account, visit http://www.CMBS.com

The annual CREFC conference was last week in Miami and, while attendance was slightly up, the mood was way worse than last year. 2011 started great (with momentum from a strong second half of 2010), but the summer spread widening caused losses and basically shut down the second half of 2011.

Going into 2012, there is very little momentum. Originations are starting at a standstill as opposed to a running start. However, it was still a fun few days, and the return to Miami Beach from Washington, DC was a welcomed change.

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The CMBS deal recently priced by Deutsche Bank and UBS was the first deal since the market crash to include publicly registered bonds (all other post crash securitizations issued private bonds using the 144A Rule).

This is a big deal. Most people agree that for the CMBS market to truly recover, we have to issue public bonds — because so many potential investors are limited to only buying publically registered bonds.

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