Don’t buy into the fear around office real estate investment trusts (REITs). Truth is, this is our moment to buy strong REIT dividends.
Don’t buy into the fear around office real estate investment trusts (REITs). Truth is, this is our moment to buy strong REIT dividends. We’re going to do it with a well-diversified 11.4%-yielding closed-end fund (CEF) trading at a ridiculous bargain.
Our opportunity lies in the fact that the fear around office landlords (Will the work-from-home crowd ever return? Will lease rates plummet? Is any of that priced in?) completely misses the point for investors.Negativity Around Office REITs Has Been Off the Charts
To get a sense of the scale of fear around office REITs, consider that Fortune magazine, despite its staid reputation, told us nine months ago that the “office real estate apocalypse” was here and “even worse than expected.”
So it follows that by now, we should be seeing deep losses among office REITs and funds that hold them, right? Well, not exactly.
Since Fortune’s panic-mongering article was published, two of the three largest office REITs, Boston Properties
BXP BXP (BXP) and Cousins Properties
CUZ CUZ (CUZ) have crushed the market. The largest, Alexandria Real Estate Equities (ARE) has lagged the S&P 500 by a bit, being up “only” 10.5% in nine months.
Still, a “mini-portfolio” of these three crushes the S&P 500, which is also why it’s not surprising that the REIT CEF we’re going to discuss today, the 11.4%-yielding Neuberger Berman Real Estate Securities Income Fund (NRO) has rolled past the S&P 500 over that time, too.
