Real Estate Investment Trust or REIT, are stocks I started my personal investing in 3 years ago. These stocks are companies that deal in real estate in some form or another. They can own the actual real estate or own the mortgages of the real estate. REITs are treated specially when it comes to tax purposes. For the corporation, all their profits are tax after the company pays out its dividends. It is required to pay out 90% of its pre-tax income to be treated as a REIT. From the individual's side they get increased pay outs from the company, a downside is that income is treated the same as wage income and usually taxed at a higher tax rate.
I think REITs are worth looking into finding the best one that fits what you are looking for. One that I will be writing about shortly is called Omega Healthcare Investments, (OHI). Other REITs that I own are ARR, AGNC, and IVR. Look for my analysis on OHI over the next week.
This post was meant to give you a little background on REITs for my OHI article that is coming.