According to research by William Newsom, head of commercial valuation at Savills, eight of the 97 lenders in the UK commercial real estate market have stopped lending to borrowers, while 11 more remain reluctant to take on risk.

Almost 30 will lend but on a qualified basis such as long standing clients buying robust assets. Lending terms have also tightened with rates for secondary properties increasing by up to 1.5%.

Newsom did not say which banks have stopped lending, but they are believed to include Credit Suisse, Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Deutsche Bank and Barclays Capital, the investment banking arm of Barclays Bank.

However, some banks are willing to lend on deals over £150m. Lloyds TSB and Eurohypo have backed Telereals £400m purchase of property from Royal Bank of Scotland.

Until this month, only one bank had been willing to syndicate debt on commercial property deals. That has now risen to six in the wake of the completion of the £1bn deal to buy Citigroups headquarters.

Meanwhile in certain parts of the investment market bidders hurried to close deals before the end of the year. Specialist property investor Evans Randall has bought Condor House near St Pauls Cathedral, for between £115-120m on a yield of 5.1%. Owner LaSalle Investment Management had agreed a deal with Glenn Mauds Propinvest earlier in the year but it failed to complete. At the time, its estimated price was £130m.

Norwich Union, was forced to sell assets from its property fund to meet redemptions and is understood to have sold Queen Street Place in the City of London for about £165m (the original asking price was £180m) and a building in Old Bailey for about £70m, against an initial price of £81m.