While many experts predict a pending commercial real estate crash that could devastate the tax base and further threaten bank stability, economist Hugh Kelly said reports of an apocalypse are overrated.

Kelly, a New York University real estate professor who spoke to members of the Economic Forum of Palm Beach County today, said he knows he’s bucking conventional beliefs when he dismisses the most dire predictions.

But, he said, a growing GDP and new jobs he believes are coming this year could soften a crash.

“I think forecasts of a crash are navigating out of a rear-view mirror of a recession that is over,” Kelly said inside the Kravis Center. “Demand for use of commercial space remains weak and absorption is negative, but we’re growing in terms of consumption.”

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In the News by David F. Carr