The U.S. residential-mortgage market’s woes keep popping up in unexpected places, even real-estate investment trusts that specialize in commercial lending, the Wall Street Journal reported today. While REITs that trade in residential mortgages have taken the main hit during the credit crunch, exposed as they are to some riskier home-loan types, those focused on commercial mortgages are feeling pinched in part because some have more exposure to residential loans than first presumed. Recent disclosures include one by RAIT Financial Trust, a commercially focused REIT, which calculated its exposure to American Home Mortgage Investment Corp., a troubled home-mortgage lender, at $95 million. That amount, if written off, is 7 percent of RAIT’s book value per share, according to some analysts. Analysts and investors say they fear there could be more of such revelations coming. UBS REIT analyst Omotayo Okusanya says most commercial-mortgage REITs suffer from poor disclosure and don’t, for instance, break out their loans by industry or highlight their top 10 borrowers.

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