CHICAGO-Two facts about the local commercial real estate market dominated the RealShare CHICAGO event, held at the Renaissance Chicago Downtown Hotel: It’s unbelievable that loan-to-value has risen back to 70% this soon after the recession, and those involved in the apartment market are just plain excited to be alive. About 250 owners, brokers, lenders and other professionals attended the event this rainy morning in the Windy City.

More than 25 speakers talked about a variety of market topics, and were mostly positive about the various asset class possibilities this year. Discussions included that the Chicago office market is at least five years from a new building, but the time to start planning for a new multifamily tower downtown may already be too late.

Other pearls of wisdom included a distressed asset panel (borrowers: communicate with your lender, or else), whether multifamily experts should worry about the future of Fannie and Freddie Mac (maybe) and that no industrial properties should be built in the Chicago area for a long time (unless it’s build-to-suit, said David Bercu, a principal with Colliers International, from the Town Hall Meeting panel).