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Nationally, about $3.4 trillion in commercial real estate loans is outstanding, and some experts predict a wave of defaults in the next few years that could make the mortgage meltdown look like a strong wind before a hurricane. While some call for government intervention to head off the next financial crisis, others say the magnitude is too great. The debt crisis facing Dubai, with its custom-island extravagances, could be a global foretaste.

With a largely jobless recovery from the "Great Recession," the root of the problem seems deep. Millions of office and industrial workers have been laid off this year alone, meaning a diminished need for physical job sites and a rise in commercial vacancies. Although Baton Rouge seems relatively resilient economically, commercial lending trouble has appeared. Mall of Louisiana owner General Growth Properties filed for bankruptcy in the spring, and banks that financed Tommy Spinosa's Perkins Rowe development foreclosed on the project in the summer.

"I'm sure there are some loans out there that might be an issue for local banks," says Larry Dietz, managing broker for Sealy & Falgoust Real Estate. "We've already seen major properties have issues in this community. Those are few and far between. How far it's going to go in terms of smaller properties or smaller investors, I couldn't begin to speculate."

Recently, a Forbes article claimed the commercial real estate market is on its last legs and bears a "catastrophic" debt that requires drastic intervention as $1.3 trillion becomes due by 2013. Yet a columnist for the Wall Street Journal claimed the problem is too great for government to help with, as it did with home loans; banks had $1.84 trillion in commercial real estate debt on their balance sheets in the second quarter, the article says, while the Troubled Asset Relief Program aided less than 30% of lenders involved.

"That's the major issue, whether or not the feds will step up in terms of trying to prevent foreclosures," Dietz says, noting that a tough refinancing market could imperil borrowers. "A lot of the commercial mortgages that were made over the past five, 10 years, they had long amortization periods, but the loans have short calls, five- to seven-year time frames."

Dietz says requirements could stiffen regarding how much equity borrowers need to put up, but what is on the horizon for local commercial property loans is guesswork for now. "It depends on whose crystal ball is correct," he says. "I don't think it is going to be quite so bad as in Arizona or Florida."