A few months ago, right before life as we know it was knocked off course, I had an idea for an experiment I wanted to try with Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs). I wanted to test out how a selection of REITs in the stock market would perform compared to eREITs in my Fundrise account. My plan for this idea was laid out in my post “REITs in the Stock Market Versus REITs in Fundrise,” which you may want to read before this one. This article follows on with additional investments I made to these accounts in May and June 2020.
REIT Investments in May
I haven’t made a formal plan on when and how much I would invest in these accounts. My initial idea was to spend about $50 to $100 per month on investments. I wanted to look for opportunities to buy in the stock market. After I made an investment through E*Trade, I would deposit an equivalent amount of money into my Fundrise account.
REITs in E*Trade
On May 13, 2020, seeing depressed prices in the market, I decided I would add one share each to two of my investments. American Campus Communities, Inc. (ACC) is the largest developer, owner, and manager of high-quality student housing in the United States. I added one share of ACC to my E*Trade portfolio for the price of $26.80. That turned out to be the lowest priced day of trading for that REIT in the month of May and now I wish that I would have bought more shares at the time.
The other REIT I added to was the Apartment Investment and Management Company (AIV), aka AIMCO, which owns and manages quality apartment communities in diverse geographical locations within the United States. I bought one share of AIV at $34.55. The total amount spent for these two purchases was $61.35.
Fundrise eREITs
A few days later I logged in to my Fundrise account to add this amount to my portfolio. That was when I learned that deposits needed to be a minimum of $100. I decided to transfer the full $100 in immediately and planned to make up for the difference in my next transaction. The May deposit was spread across three eREITs in my Balanced Investing portfolio as shown in the table below.
| Name | Quantity | Price | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Income eREIT V | 2.961000 | $10.00 | $29.61 |
| Growth eREIT VI | 2.963000 | $10.00 | $29.63 |
| Balanced eREIT | 4.076000 | $10.00 | $40.76 |
REIT Investments in June
As the end of the school year approached, I found myself increasingly helping my 10-year-old son get through his virtual learning school work. Plans for blogging, investing, and making YouTube videos were set aside as I helped him with final projects and keeping on track with his daily workload. Through this period market prices had been rising anyway. The last day of school was on June 10. This coincided with a slight decrease in market prices, allowing me to purchase a few more REIT shares (though I missed getting even better deals by one day).
I knew I would have to spend at least $38.65 to make up for the extra money I had deposited in Fundrise in May. Since Fundrise has a $100 deposit minimum, I added that to the total amount I would plan to invest through E*Trade in June. In the E*Trade account, I had some cash left over that I could use for investing and I transferred an additional $120 into the account to pay for my orders.
REITs in E*Trade
This time I bought shares in three of the other REITs I held in the account. I knew I definitely wanted another share of W. P. Carey Inc. (WPC), a net-lease REIT that invests in high-quality single-tenant industrial, warehouse, office, retail, and self-storage properties in the United States and Europe. I bought one share of WPC at $67.95.
I also wanted to add to my shares of STORE Capital Corporation (STOR), another net-lease REIT which operates in the service, retail, and manufacturing sectors. The company is taking a hard hit in the current environment, but I am optimistic for the long term. I purchased two shares at a price of $25.20. I wish I would have grabbed more shares when the price was in the teens in April.
I’ll be honest that I wasn’t sure which REIT to go with for my final purchase. I was tempted to plunk down for another share of AIV. Instead, I chose to go with Healthpeak Properties, Inc. (PEAK), which owns and develops real estate in the healthcare industry for the simple reason that it allowed me to get a better average cost basis. I bought one share of PEAK at $28.90.
The image below shows the transactions for my E*Trade account for both May and June of 2020. You can see all of the purchases made that I have described. In May, I also collected and reinvested dividends in PEAK, ACC, and AIV. As of June 12, 2020, the total value of my E*Trade account is $1,322.10.
Fundrise eREITs
In order to figure out my equivalent deposit in Fundrise for June, I had to complete some calculations. The total amount of money I had invested in REITs in E*Trade was $147.25. Then I added the small amount of cash that remained in the account from what I had added but didn’t use for the investments, which was $6.77. Next, I subtracted the extra amount that I deposited in Fundrise in May in order to make the $100 deposit minimum, which was above the cost of the May E*Trade investments: $38.65. This left me with $115.37.
Since my previous post about this experiment, Fundrise has opened up the ability to invest directly into individual eREITs on the platform. I decided that I would deposit the $115 directly into one of the eREITs in my Fundrise account that was at the stabilizing level, Income eREIT II. This eREIT holds 12 active projects, 7 of which are in California. Last year it had a total return of 8.4%. For verification purposes on my deposits, I am sharing the transaction page from Fundrise below.
The total amount of money now invested in my Fundrise account is $1,410.64. That means that my Fundrise account is currently up $88.54 over my E*Trade account.
How will the summer months impact these investments? I’ll look back on this experiment again in August after another round of purchases.
Disclosure:Information shared on Squintillions is based on the author’s own experiences, thought processes, and research and is not intended as professional advice. Please do your own research before committing to any investment! If you feel your personal challenges are beyond the scope of my suggestions or other self-help materials, please seek professional counseling. Further, there are some affiliate links and ads used in this website. If you purchase an item when following these links, I may receive a commission on your purchase.