September marked the 20th consecutive month that distressed sales made up more than 20 percent of commercial property sales, according to Moody’s/REAL Commercial Property Price Index. The index reported distressed transactions for the month accounted for 25.9 percent of all commercial transactions.

While distressed sales were in keeping with recent trends, commercial property prices broke a four-month streak of increases with a 1.4 percent decline in September, according to Moody’s.

However, on a quarterly basis, prices rose in all four commercial property sectors from the previous quarter. Retail and apartments posted the highest gains rising 10.4 percent and 6.3 percent, respectively.

Industrial and office properties posted much more modest declines at 2.4 percent and 1.2 percent, respectively.

Moody’s also measures price changes in the top 10 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) measured by dollar volume. Prices for three of the four property types increased over the third quarter in the top 10 MSAs.

Industrial property prices posted a decline for the quarter, while office properties posted the highest increase – a 20.2 percent rise for the quarter.

Office properties posted the second-highest increase with a 14.9 percent rise in prices, and retail followed with a 10.1 percent increase.

Looking forward, the agency expects prices to continue bottoming out over the next two years.

Moody’s expects multi-family and hotel properties to begin recovering before office and retail properties, which have to work through additional obstacles of “excess vacancy and the burn off of above market rent leases,” the report states.

By August 2016, Moody’s expects commercial prices to register at 8.3 percent above their August 2011 average and 43.4 percent above their trough in 2009.

A year later in 2017, commercial prices will be 14.3 percent above levels recorded in August of this year and 51.5 percent above their trough in 2009.