In the financial planning/investment world, most advisors would say that you should buy REIT as an income driven type of vehicle. In other words, most of the clients who are in REITs are mostly retired or soon to be retired folks. With the REIT globalization and the effects of the dollar getting weaker (and expect to continue in this trend) against the Euro and Sterling (dollar was at a 14-year low against the Sterling couple of weeks ago), it makes sense to have a portion of your investable assets in Global REITs — not only to hedge against inflation but you’re also hedging currency. Traditionally, one would say that you should be concerned of the foreign interest rate fluctuation, politics, reporting standards, bla…bla… well, we got the same problems here in the US. And I’m sure Bill Gates and his analytical army figure out the pros and cons before tapping into that region long ago. We tend to be bias of our own economy and that’s natural. I’m sure the Europeans are bias of their own local growth. Bottom line is we need to look beyond our front door in regards with investing. And in the case that your desire is to own a piece of the European coastline, that’s an entirely different equation all together.

One thing to keep in mind for certain is that Private REITs are sticky assets (most likely locked in for 10 or more years which could be a bad thing) as oppose to a Real Estate Mutual Fund which is typically daily liquidity.

Now, let’s bring the real estate topic locally for a minute. We’ve seen reports that a number of people have made a nice sum of money trading real estate properties in the past couple of years. What the newspapers and magazines failed to report is that many of these folks’ get-rich-quit attempts have gone sour. Buying properties at an all time high because they gotta get into the game since a friend of a friend made out like a bandit but ending up with a hole in their wallets because they’re still sitting on these properties. Flipping properties is not a new game and it’s not dead one either. My prudent advice here is to work with a real estate professional (see http://www.derrikdyka.com) that you trust not only to find a diamond in the rough but also the willingness to give you guidance along the way. At end of the day, don’t feel bad to admit you’re not everything – we all need professionals to make us whole, whether it’s CPA for our taxes, attorneys for our troubles, and realtors for… well, you know.