Commercial Real Estate Credit —
Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC
The state of disclosed CRE credit in this market · NC, SC
The read
$2.1B of CMBS across 95 loans. Distress is rising in the filed record — 3.3% as of 2026-07. The heaviest maturity load lands in 2029 ($610M, 29% of the book). Office is the largest book ($620M, 11.3% distressed). 24 on-the-ground distress events in the past year (190 jobs).
Overview
CMBS
Submarkets
Local Banks
Jobs & Demand
On The Ground
Loading map…
The CMBS properties our stress model flags here, plus recent store closures and layoffs. Stressed is a wider net than distressed — the distressed figure above counts only loans already in special servicing or 60+ days delinquent, while these dots also include performing loans facing maturity or coverage pressure. Property dots sit at the center of their ZIP code, not the building — they show where stress concentrates, not which asset. Closures and layoffs are pinned to address where we have it. Open any dot to the building and the loan behind it →
Office Carries the Weight as Charlotte's Filed Record Turns
Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia carries $2.1 billion of CMBS across 95 loans, and the distress rate in the filed record has been rising, reaching 3.3% as of July 2026. That is a manageable figure against the size of the book, and with a median DSCR of 1.57 and a metro unemployment rate of 3.7% — down half a point year over year — the fundamentals underneath these loans are steadier than the trend line alone suggests.
The pressure is concentrated in one sector. Office is the largest book at $620 million and runs 11.3% distressed — level with the national office rate, and well clear of retail, hospitality and mixed-use, each of which shows no distress in the filed record here despite carrying national rates of 2.7%, 6.1% and 5.0% respectively. The maturity wall matters for how this plays out: the heaviest load lands in 2029 at $610 million, 29% of the book, though that vintage is currently only 4.6% distressed. The sharper reading sits in the 2028 maturities, a smaller $0.3 billion slice already marked 14.8% distressed.
On the ground, the metro logged 23 distress events over the past year — 14 store closures and nine layoff notices, the latter accounting for 190 jobs. Among the 10 banks tracked here, none are distressed and one carries an early-warning flag. For desks watching Charlotte, office is the line to underwrite, and 2028 is the near-term date to watch.
CMBS Distressed UPB
$70M / 3.4%
in special servicing or 60+ days delinquent
CMBS Maturing ≤ 24mo
$424M
Local Banks (stressed)
0 / 10
Bank Early-Warning
1 flagged
Store Closures (1y)
15
Layoff Notices (1y)
9 / 190 jobs
0.02% of metro employment
CMBS Loans / UPB
95 / $2.1B
Unemployment · Jul 2026
3.7%
-0.5pp yr
How much CRE distress is there in Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC right now?
Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC shows a mixed distress picture: 3 of 6 signal pairs read elevated on both sides, 0 pairs read quiet on both sides, and 3 pairs disagree. Elevated readings come from store closures (12 closures, 1.02 per 100k jobs), WARN layoff notices (10 notices, 0.01% of employment), and bank CRE over the noncurrent line ($3,181.2 mm, 8.14% of allocated CRE). However, the closures and WARN legs are elevated by size, not by rate — they rank 38th and 55th of 392 and 386 metros by count, but only 266th and 228th by rate, respectively. The bank leg is genuinely elevated on rate (92nd of 393 by rate). The CMBS leg is not elevated: 2 rows in special servicing, a floor reading (1.35% of the securitized balance), so it reads quiet. The three disagreements are structural: closures hot vs. CMBS quiet suggests retail failing on buildings the tape doesn't hold; WARN hot vs. CMBS quiet suggests employers cutting while the securitized book hasn't moved; and bank hot vs. CMBS quiet means lenders here are stressed on a book the tape cannot see. Overall, distress is present and concentrated in bank credit and small-scale retail/employment stress, not in securitized or large-employer channels.
The figures behind this answer
| Signal | Level | Rate | Rank by count | Rank by rate | Reading |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| store closures store closures per 100,000 jobs |
12 closures | 1.02 per 100k jobs | 38 of 392 | 266 of 392 | elevated trailing 365 days to today
|
| layoff notices (WARN) workers on layoff notices as a share of the metro's employment |
10 notices | 0.01% | 55 of 386 | 228 of 386 | elevated trailing 365 days to today
|
| bank CRE at lenders over the noncurrent line share of the CRE lent into this metro that sits at a lender over the blended-noncurrent line |
$3.18bn | 8.14% | 20 of 393 | 92 of 393 | elevated
allocated 2026-03-31
|
| securitized loans in special servicing share of the securitized balance read here that is in special servicing |
2 loan records | 1.35% | 66 of 335 | 97 of 335 | quiet
floor 2026-07-29
|
6 pairs compared
3 both elevated
0 both quiet
3 disagreeing
0 unreadable — a side is blind
3 of four legs elevated
one metro, four independent feeds, each on its own denominator
{'coverage': "114 of 441 metros have at least one blind leg and 48 are blind on all four. Those 48 are the same metros the board's map cannot place and the metro resolver cannot name: one ZIP-to-CBSA crosswalk boundary, showing up three ways.", 'a_count_ranks_by_size': 'Elevation is computed on the COUNT, over a flat threshold, which is a size filter. New York is 2nd of 392 by store closures and 264th of the same 392 by closures per job — both true, and which one you lead with decides what the reader believes. Every leg carries both ranks over ONE population; quote the rate beside the count.', 'disagreement_is_not_severity': 'Where two legs disagree, that is usually a fact about WHICH mechanism is running, not an error in either feed and not a worse metro. The six pairs read different populations, and each note is a STRUCTURAL prior about those populations — nothing here measures a lead or a lag between two legs, so never report one as timing.', 'a_blind_leg_is_not_a_quiet_one': "A leg with no denominator, or whose numerator cannot be measured, reads LOW and means nothing. Each leg publishes a measurement state (allocated, floor, measured, no denominator, no rate, not measurable) for that reason. Never report a blind leg as 'no distress'."}
{'fork': 'elevated by size, not by rate', 'note': 'store closures, layoff notices (WARN) clear a flat count threshold while sitting below the median of their own rate ranking. Any reading that leans on them is a statement about how big this metro is.'}
{'leg': 'closures', 'unit': 'jobs', 'as_of': 'trailing 365 days to today', 'value': 1178258, 'measures': 'store closures', 'available': True, 'as_of_kind': 'window', 'what_it_is': "all metro jobs, QCEW annual average — a SIZE normaliser, not a matched population: the feed spans retail, food service and pharmacy and no single QCEW sector covers it. The MATCHED read sits beside it as this leg's second reading"}
{'leg': 'warn', 'unit': 'employed', 'as_of': 'trailing 365 days to today', 'value': 1431898, 'measures': 'layoff notices (WARN)', 'available': True, 'as_of_kind': 'window', 'what_it_is': 'employed persons, BLS LAUS, not seasonally adjusted'}
{'leg': 'bank', 'unit': '$mm', 'as_of': '2026-03-31', 'value': 39064.6, 'measures': 'bank CRE at lenders over the noncurrent line', 'available': True, 'as_of_kind': 'stamp', 'what_it_is': 'bank CRE allocated to this metro by branch deposits'}
{'leg': 'cmbs', 'unit': '$mm', 'as_of': '2026-07-29', 'value': 2080.0, 'measures': 'securitized loans in special servicing', 'available': True, 'as_of_kind': 'stamp', 'what_it_is': "current balance on the non-pari-passu rows of this tape — the trust's slice, not the whole loan, on both sides of the ratio"}
Written from the figures above · CBSA 16740 · stress_metro · last changed 28 Aug 2026
· Ask your own question →
Which distress signals are elevated in Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC, and which cannot be read?
In Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC, the elevated distress signals are bank distressed CRE, closures, and WARN notices. The bank distressed CRE reading is driven by $3.18bn in distressed lender CRE and a 10.5% 90th-percentile share of bank CRE at risk, with 0 distressed bank assets. Closures and WARN notices are elevated, with 12 store closures and 10 WARN notices in the past year. The CMBS special-servicing reading is modest, with $28.0mm in special-servicing UPB (a 1.3% share of metro UPB), and the stated materiality notes this is a floor because the other special-servicing rows carry no balance. Unavailable readings include the distressed-bank count (given as 0) and any specific national benchmark comparisons; the figures provided do not include a CMBS delinquency rate or a broader market distress index, so those cannot be read from this data.
The figures behind this answer
- CMBS in special servicing
- $28.0mm
- … as a share of this metro's CMBS balance
- 1.3%
- Bank CRE lent into this metro
- $39.06bn
- … at risk at the 90th percentile
- 10.5%
- CRE at lenders over the noncurrent line
- $3.18bn
- Assets at those lenders
- $0.00bn
- … share needing no branch-deposit allocation
- 2.4%
- Signals reading elevated
- bank CRE over the noncurrent line, store closures, WARN layoff notices
- Legs agreeing
- 3
- Phase
- peak
- CMBS loans in special servicing
- 2
- Distressed banks
- 0
- Store closures (past year)
- 12
- WARN notices (past year)
- 10
leading (real-economy) and realized (credit) signals are firing together
tens of millions of distressed CRE exposure; measured over 50.0% of this metro's 2 special-servicing rows — the rest carry no balance, so the dollar figure is a FLOOR
credit distress AND ground-level distress, with real dollars behind the credit side
Written from the figures above · CBSA 16740 · geo_metro_signals · last changed 27 Aug 2026
· Ask your own question →
Jobs & Demand — the labor market under the collateralWatch it change →
Every other zone on this page reads the credit — what the loan is doing.
This one reads the demand underneath it. Office jobs pay office rent;
office rent services the office loan. When the jobs go, the DSCR follows — but not for another year or two.
That lag is the whole point of looking here.
Unemployment · Jul 2026
3.7%
-0.5pp yr
Last 24 months
3.4%4.3%
Monthly metro unemployment (BLS LAUS) — the freshest labor signal there is,
about six weeks behind. Read the direction, not the level: a 4% metro that is rising and a 6% metro that is
falling are not telling you the same thing.
Jobs by CRE-relevant sector · 2024
Annual employment by sector (BLS QCEW, 2024; 1,178,258 jobs in the metro).
QCEW lags — it is the structural read, not the current one, and we pair it with the monthly unemployment above on purpose.
Office-using sums five supersectors; where BLS withholds any one of them for
disclosure, we show nothing rather than a number we know is too low — so a missing sector here means
“suppressed at the source,” not “zero.”
Sector Heat — CMBS distress rate by property type (metro vs national)See the loans behind the bar →
This metro's CMBS runs 3.4% distressed where its own property mix predicts 6.3% — $62M less than this book would carry at the rate each property type runs elsewhere in the country, dollar-weighted and excluding this metro. The gap is measured; the cause is not. 0 of 4 property types here run a higher distress rate than the national average for that type (the tick on each bar).
Elimination — does the gap survive a control?
Each row re-prices this metro's book on a finer cell — its own property types, then those types split by loan size, then by vintage — always at the rate that cell runs elsewhere in the country, dollar-weighted. A gap that shrinks toward zero is explained by the control; one that stays has ruled it out. What is measured is what survives, not a cause.
property mix alone
-2.9pp
… and loan size held fixed
-2.8pp
the gap is still there with loan size held fixed too
… and vintage held fixed
-3.6pp
the gap is still there with vintage held fixed too
The largest single contributor is Hospitality: 23 loans, $376M, running 0.0% where the same type runs 6.1% elsewhere — worth 1.1pp of this metro's own rate.
Maturity Wall — CMBS coming due by year, distress within eachSee what’s maturing →
$424M — 20% of the metro's balance — matures within two years; the red slice of each bar is already distressed.
Distress Trend — is this market turning?Track it quarter by quarter →
Realized distress is RISING — 3.3% now (2026-07), +1.9pp over the year.
Same definition as the cards above — distressed means in special servicing or 60+ days delinquent, dollar-weighted — on a different clock. The cards are today’s tape; this is the disclosed history panel, quarter by quarter, so you can read direction rather than level. Trusts file monthly, so a quarter is usually well covered within weeks of opening and the newest one shown is normally the current one; it is withheld only when its filed book falls below 60% of recent quarters.
Share of the metro’s CMBS in special servicing or 60+ days delinquent, by quarter — a firmer, backward-looking read. A loan under 1.0x DSCR that is still paying is not counted here.
Submarket Heat — where in the metro the distress sitsOpen the submarket →
The top three submarkets hold $1.3B of the metro's $2.1B; each bar's colored share is its distress rate.
Bank Door — what the local bank sector could absorbSee it on every loan’s exit read →
$424M of CMBS matures here within two years.
The 20 regional and local banks that gather deposits here could write roughly
$570M more CRE before the 300% supervisory line, so the maturing balance is
0.74× that room.
The median metro sits at 0.12×.
Regional Bank Room
$570M
After Committed Draws
$210M / −63%
Maturing ÷ Room
0.74×
Banks In Footprint
20 / 3 at the line
The room above is already part-sold. Construction lending is a promise drawn
down over two or three years, and the undrawn part is an obligation the bank cannot decline while the borrower performs
— every one of those dollars lands in the same CRE book the 300% line governs. These banks
have $529M of construction committed and not yet
advanced, of which $360M
comes out of the room above, leaving $210M,
with 8 banks
whose entire remaining room is spoken for.
A bank with no room contributes zero here, never a negative one — capacity does not net
across balance sheets — so $169M of what has
been promised is not deducted at all, because there is nothing left to deduct it from. On today’s
capital that is funding already contracted which would cross the line as it draws.
SR 06-26 draws a second line at 100% of capital for construction and land:
1 of 20
is past it on drawn balances alone, and
13 more cross it
once their own commitments fund.
Counted — 20 regional & local CRE lenders
| Bank | Deposit share | CRE / Capital* | Room contributed | Noncurrent CRE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Farmers & Merchants Bank NC | 96.9% | 210% total 249%
|
🔒 | 0.79% |
| Townebank VA | 6.9% | 249% total 345%
|
🔒 | 0.19% |
| Uwharrie Bank NC | 38.8% | 172% total 260%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| Peoples Bank NC | 30.2% | 215% total 338%
|
🔒 | 0.16% |
| New Republic Bank NC | 85.1% | 130% total 135%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| The Fidelity Bank NC | 6.2% | 206% total 373%
|
🔒 | 0.47% |
| The Park National Bank OH | 2.1% | 197% total 270%
|
🔒 | 0.81% |
| American Bank Of The Carolinas NC | 100.0% | 216% total 307%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| Blueharbor Bank NC | 97.0% | 274% total 378%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| First Bank NC | 4.7% | 280% total 366%
|
🔒 | 0.40% |
| Hometrust Bank NC | 3.0% | 235% total 324%
|
🔒 | 0.68% |
| Movement Bank VA | 54.7% | 203% total 353%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| Oakworth Capital Bank AL | 2.9% | 190% total 305%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| Ameris Bank GA | 0.6% | 263% total 319%
|
🔒 | 0.12% |
| Southern First Bank SC | 1.5% | 236% total 397%
|
🔒 | 0.23% |
| First Palmetto Bank SC | 7.4% | 266% total 409%
|
🔒 | 0.01% |
| Arthur State Bank SC | 1.7% | 175% total 303%
|
🔒 | 0.04% |
| Commercial Bank TN | 5.0% | 307% total 480%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| First Community Bank SC | 3.2% | 316% total 473%
|
🔒 | 0.00% |
| Carter Bank & Trust VA | 2.9% | 395% total 423%
|
🔒 | 0.84% |
Not counted — 27 banks with deposits here
These hold deposits in this metro but are left out of the capacity above, because for them deposit location stops indicating where they lend — or they do not lend CRE at all. Real money that could refinance here is deliberately not counted.
no CRE book — CRE under 100% of capital — not a CRE lender
Bank Of America, National Association NC · Truist Bank NC · Wells Fargo Bank, National Association SD · Fifth Third Bank, National Association OH · First-Citizens Bank & Trust Company NC · Pnc Bank, National Association DE · Jpmorgan Chase Bank, National Association OH · Td Bank, National Association DE · Regions Bank AL · First Federal Savings Bank Of Lincolnton NC · U.s. Bank National Association OH · Bank Of York SC · Spratt Savings Bank SC · Belmont Savings Bank, Ssb NC · The Huntington National Bank OH · Mechanics & Farmers Bank NC
national — operates in more than 5 states, so deposits stop indicating where it lends
Pinnacle Bank TN · First National Bank Of Pennsylvania PA · First Horizon Bank TN · Bank Ozk AR · Southstate Bank, National Association FL · United Community Bank SC · Woodforest National Bank TX · United Bank VA · Encore Bank AR · Servisfirst Bank AL · Flagstar Bank, National Association NY
* Two ratios, two perimeters.
The large figure is supervisory CRE over total risk-based capital —
construction, multifamily and non-owner-occupied nonfarm nonresidential. That is the book SR 06-26 draws its
300% line against, and it is what the red coloring and the room contributed are both measured on.
Total beneath it adds owner-occupied CRE — lending to a business on
its own premises — which the guidance deliberately leaves out. A bank can sit well above 300% on total CRE and
still be inside the line, with real room to lend; both are shown so the gap is visible rather than surprising.
How to read this. It is not whether any particular loan can refinance — a borrower also reaches
national banks, life companies, agencies and debt funds. It is how much of this metro’s maturing volume the local
bank sector could absorb if it were the only door.
Banks are placed by deposit share (FDIC Summary of Deposits, June 2025) — a proxy for
where they lend, not a measurement; call reports carry no collateral geography. Room = 3× total risk-based capital less CRE held
(SR 06-26, the capital base the rule names — not book equity), from Q2 2026 call reports, apportioned by that share.
Committed construction comes from FFIEC Schedule RC-L as filed at 2026-06-30 —
the undrawn half of loans already written, which the balance sheet above does not show.
Banks in more than 5 states, single-branch bookers and banks that do not lend CRE are excluded —
313 banks holding $268.2B of national capacity not counted here.
Local Lenders — banks headquartered here, worst CRE noncurrent firstUnlock each bank’s early-warning flag →
| Bank | Total CRE | CRE / Capital* | Noncurrent CRE | Early Warning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Farmers & Merchants Bank | $395M | 210% total 249%
|
0.79% | 🔒 |
| Bank Of America, National Association | $79.9B | 27% total 39%
|
1.57% | 🔒 |
| Truist Bank | $51.0B | 57% total 87%
|
0.45% | 🔒 |
| Blueharbor Bank | $296M | 274% total 378%
|
0.00% | 🔒 |
| American Bank Of The Carolinas | $86M | 216% total 307%
|
0.00% | 🔒 |
* Two ratios, two perimeters.
The large figure is supervisory CRE over total risk-based capital —
construction, multifamily and non-owner-occupied nonfarm nonresidential. That is the book SR 06-26 draws its
300% line against, and it is what the red coloring and the room contributed are both measured on.
Total beneath it adds owner-occupied CRE — lending to a business on
its own premises — which the guidance deliberately leaves out. A bank can sit well above 300% on total CRE and
still be inside the line, with real room to lend; both are shown so the gap is visible rather than surprising.
Banks are matched to their HQ metro (a proxy for footprint). Noncurrent CRE = CRE-balance-weighted blend of multifamily / nonresidential / construction noncurrent (distress already arrived). Early Warning is a validated leading signal — the bank’s 30-89 early-delinquency rank among all CRE lenders this quarter, which has predicted ~2.3× forward CRE distress. Per-bank flags are on a plan.
Apartment-REIT Operating Read — same-store disclosures for this metro · as of 2026-07-30Set against the loan book →
Same-Store NOI
-1.7%
Same-Store Revenue
-1.0%
Occupancy
95.3%
Rent Growth
-1.0%
| REIT | SS NOI | SS Revenue | Occupancy | Rent | As Of |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CPT | -1.3% | -0.8% | 95.0% | -1.1% | 2026-07-30 |
| MAA | -2.1% | -1.1% | 95.7% | -0.9% | 2026-07-29 |
Same-store operating results disclosed by public apartment REITs (AVB · EQR · ESS · MAA · CPT · UDR) for this market in their quarterly supplements. Directional market context — an operating trend, not a Verstavo score.
On The Ground — recent closures, layoffs & CRE bankruptciesTie these events to loans →
24 local distress events in the past year (190 jobs) — store closures, layoffs, and commercial real estate bankruptcies near this metro's collateral.
2026-09-05
LAYOFF
Charlotte
2026-09-04
CLOSURE
Gastonia
2026-09-03
CLOSURE
Mint Hill
2026-08-30
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-08-30
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-08-26
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-08-25
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-08-11
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-08-07
LAYOFF
16 jobs · Kershaw
2026-08-07
LAYOFF
13 jobs · Kershaw
2026-08-03
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-07-30
LAYOFF
Charlotte
2026-07-30
LAYOFF
Charlotte
2026-07-20
CLOSURE
Charlotte
2026-07-16
BANKRUPTCY
CRE-linked bankruptcy
What has actually happened on the ground in Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC recently?
In the Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC metro over the past 365 days, on-the-ground distress signals are mixed but lean negative: there were 13 store closures, alongside 9 WARN notices that affected at least 190 jobs (a floor, since notices without a headcount count but add 0 jobs). Separately, 3 CRE-likely bankruptcies were recorded in the states where this metro’s collateral sits (a state proxy, not a metro-native count). The jobs-affected figure of 190 pulls from the 9 notices, while the 13 closures and 190 jobs affected are hard counts—no additional metro-specific reading on new construction or leasing is available here.
The figures behind this answer
- Store closures
- 13
- WARN layoff notices
- 9
- Jobs on those notices
- 190
- CRE-related bankruptcies
- 3
- Window, in days
- 365
STATE PROXY — bankruptcy filings carry the filer's state, not the property's location, so this counts CRE-likely filings in the states this metro's collateral sits in. It is not a metro-native count.
affected_employees is nullable — notices that state no headcount are counted but contribute 0 jobs, so this is a floor.
Closures are matched ZIP -> CBSA and only APPROVED rows count (a pending, machine-extracted row is not yet a closure). This mirrors the Metro Pulse page, not the convergence board — the board applies neither filter and counts higher. Layoffs take the same ZIP -> CBSA and review treatment, and a WARN notice counts if it affects >= 10 people or does not state a headcount (a NULL is not 'fewer than 10').
Written from the figures above · CBSA 16740 · geo_events · last changed 06 Sep 2026
· Ask your own question →
What this page can’t do
Everything above is a snapshot — one market, as it stands today, and
it’s yours to read. What a snapshot can’t tell you is when it moves: which loan slipped a DSCR band
this month, which bank’s early-warning rank crossed into the top quartile, which submarket started turning
while the headline number still looked fine. Distress doesn’t announce itself on the day you happen to check.
This page
One metro · one moment · you come looking.
Verstavo
Every metro · every month · it comes looking for you.
CMBS covers the securitized slice of CRE; bank, closure and layoff signals widen the view.
“No data” in a zone means we don’t observe it here, not that there is no stress.
Employment is BLS (QCEW annual, LAUS monthly) — public data, and the demand leg under all of it.
See the whole picture, not just the pulse.
Metro Pulse is the free, public read. The Verstavo platform goes loan‑by‑loan — stress
scores, maturity walls, special‑servicing transfers, bank CRE, and your own portfolio benchmarked
against the market.