Understanding REITs

I just read REITs for dummies by Brad Thomas, which was published by John Wiley & Sons. I have known of Brad for a while, but we spoke for the first time in early November, and he sent me a copy of his book. Brad is a long-time contributor to Seeking Alpha, where he publishes lots of articles and also runs a service for investors.

Brad did a good job of discussing the history of Real Estate Investment Trusts, which were legalized in 1960. The evolution has been challenging, but they are a large part of the global stock market. One of the big highlights of the sector was when Standard & Poor's added REITs to the index in 2001, and Brad also details how it was added as a separate sector instead of including them in Financials. Currently there are 11 Global Industry Classification Standard (GICS) industries, and Real Estate represents 2% of the S&P 500. It is about 7% of the S&P 400 (Mid-Cap) and the S&P 600 (Small-Cap).

Brad's book is written in 4 parts: getting started, exploring the universe, Reits for all investors and two chapters to discuss FAQs and mistakes to avoid. There are 14 chapters overall. Thomas knows real estate and knows investing. What a fabulous effort!

I actually follow two cannabis REITs, one of which I currently include in my model portfolio, and, for personal investing, I do follow closely one REIT. After reading this, I did a review of the REIT universe and came up with some that I might follow more closely. I sure appreciate Brad's fine work and his kindness to share it with me, and I think this is an important topic for investors to learn about.