For the third year in a row, Wells Fargo was the top multifamily lender in 2011, closing on more than $10.6 billion overall, up from $8.4 billion in 2010, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA).

The San Francisco-based bank was top among all lenders for Fannie Mae and Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loans, with volumes of $2.7 billion and $1.4 billion, respectively. CBRE was the top-ranked Freddie Mac lender by a longshot, closing $4.3 billion last year. Northmarq came in second with $2.47 billion.

For the New York-based CBRE, its Freddie volume accounted for more than 71 percent of its overall multifamily debt production last year, which is no surprise given that Mitch Kiffe, a former top Freddie exec, co-runs the company’s capital markets group. The company’s overall figure of $6.1 billion was more than 30 percent higher than the $4.2 billion it recorded in 2010.

Pittsburgh-based PNC Real Estate leapfrogged Berkadia up the rankings, taking the No. 3 spot last year with $5.2 billion in multifamily loans, up from $3 billion the year before. Berkadia, meanwhile, saw its volume slip from $4.1 billion in 2010 to $3.7 billion last year.

After Wells, the top five Fannie Mae lenders included Deutsche Bank, Walker & Dunlop, CWCapital and Beech Street Capital. Following CBRE on the Freddie rankings were Northmarq Capital, Berkadia, Wells Fargo and HFF. Among FHA lenders, Wells eked out a victory over Red Mortgage Capital, which recorded just about $70 million less than Wells last year, at $1.42 billion. Following Red were Berkadia and Greystone.

In terms of affordable multifamily housing, the MBA dubbed Wells Fargo tops, at $1.8 billion. But the MBA data is very incomplete—its coverage with the banking sector is lacking and doesn’t allow a full view of the affordable housing space. In our exclusive ranking of the top affordable housing lenders of 2011 , Citi Community Capital came out on top. The MBA didn’t receive data from Citi, nor did they receive similar data from Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, U.S. Bank, RBC Capital Markets or Capital One Bank, which were all among our Top 10.

Top 10 Multifamily Lenders of 2011
1. Wells Fargo: $10.676 billion
2. CBRE Capital Markets: $6.138 billion
3. PNC Real Estate: $5.215 billion
4. Berkadia: $3.790 billion
5. Deutsche Bank Commercial Real Estate: $3.726 billion
6. CWCapital: $3.595 billion
7. Prudential Mortgage Capital: $3.063 billion
8. KeyBank Real Estate Capital: $2.896 billion
9. Walker & Dunlop: $2.724 billion
10. Northmarq Capital: $2.474 billion
Source: Mortgage Bankers Association