Commercial Real Estate Direct Staff Report

Freddie Mac's multifamily business generated $494 million of profit in the fourth quarter, bringing full-year profit to a record $2.1 billion.

The quarterly earnings were lower than the $710 million posted in the third quarter because of a decline in gains from the sale of loans during the latest period. And the full-year earnings compare with $1.3 billion of earnings in 2011.

The $494 million of profit the housing-finance agency's multifamily business generated amounts to roughly 11 percent of the $4.5 billion of profit the agency posted from all its business segments in the latest quarter.

Freddie, which released its earnings late last week, said the increase in annual earnings was due largely to the greater volume of lending it completed. Last year, Freddie had a record $28.8 billion of volume from its multifamily-business unit. That was up from $20.3 billion in 2011. At the same time, the quality of its portfolio has improved, with the delinquency rate of its portfolio declining to 0.19 percent as of the end of the year - a three-year low - from 0.22 percent a year earlier.

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