If you haven't heard of real estate investment trusts (REITs) before you may be about to find just what you are looking for. A Reit allows you to get all of the benefits of owning property, making money on rent and other profits, while not having to hold the title and do any of the work to keep the property up and operational.



Here's how it works.

Instead of having to own a piece of property, you will be purchasing a share in a real estate management group. There will be at least 100 shareholders that join into the purchase and their money will be pooled to be used for real estate development or real estate management.

Once there are purchases, at least 90 percent of the profits from the rent and other profits of the investment will be given back to the shareholders in the form of dividends. The other 10 percent can be put into maintenance or growing the REIT. This means you will almost always see a good return on real estate through REITs. All you need is a series of places that are rented and you will have regular money coming in.

This kind of profit making on property is essentially what you were thinking of doing on your own through real estate investing. If you were going to buy a piece of property, you would either want to sell or lease it out to make a profit. The only problem is that you would also be responsible for all the work of keeping the place in order and keeping things running. By moving into the REIT market you are able to get all of the benefits of this fund without having any of the headaches.

Now, it's important to note that you may not make a fortune in REIT investing, but it is a pretty steady way to see income, and sometimes you really can hit it just right and make a fortune. As a matter of fact some people, like Ivana Trump, count real estate as the only place to put their money. She was quoted as saying. "I made a tremendous amount of money on real estate. I'll take real estate rather than go to Wall Street and get 2.8 percent. Forget about it."

If you don't know enough about REITs to make an intelligent decision on purchasing them, never fear there are great resources as close as your fingertip. Start by logging on to REITBuyer.com. Their site is full of resources and education to give you the grounding you need before purchasing a REIT. Once you're ready to buy, they can handle that for you as they are investing real estate brokers. Once you have added a few REITs to your portfolio they can help you keep track of them with tools and other resources to keep an eye on your investments and to see how they are stacking up.

This article was written by Earl E. Bird, spokesperson for the REITbuyer.com, a site dedicated to educating Real Estate Investors on how to invest in Real Estate Mutual Funds to diversify their investing portfolio. Learn more at http://www.reitbuyer.com