"By giving us generous financial terms, they were saying, 'we don't want you to go into South Florida and drive prices down,'" said LeFrak. He added that he'd get involved in another Corus-like deal "in a heartbeat." Earlier in the discussion, though, he warned, "The problem imbedded in these failed banks is that there are hundreds of billions in losses."

The crushing weight of an avalanche of bad debt is not the only challenge where a more proactive effort by the federal government could lighten the load for the commercial real estate sector, panelists said. "Our industry is a derivative of the economy," said DeBoer. "We need jobs."

On a more upbeat note, LeFrak said the "digestive process" that banks are going through will allow them to write down losses and thus create distressed buying opportunities. DeBoer predicted a possible uptick in sales volume next year as would-be sellers move to avoid being taxed at a higher capital gains rate come 2011.

And while LeFrak jokingly described negotiating a lease with a commercial tenant in the current market as "like having a colonoscopy," Rudin pointed out, "The good news is that we're making deals again. We may not like the rents or the TIs, but we're doing deals. At the beginning of the year, we weren't doing any." The hour-long discussion was moderated by Steve Liesman, senior economics reporter at CNBC.