REITs fall in April amid broader market volatility

U.S. REITs fell nearly 4.4 percent in April, according to the FTSE Nareit Equity REITs Index, amid stock market volatility and continued merger and acquisition activity. By contrast, the S&P 500 Index declined 8.8 percent in April.

“In the current environment, REITs are well positioned relative to general equities and bonds,” said David Auerbach, managing director of Armada ETF Advisors, in an interview with IREI. “Several subsectors within the REIT industry, such as multifamily, single-family rental and manufactured housing REITs have very low vacancy levels and operate in regions of the country that are seeing strong population growth and high prices for single-family homes, thus giving landlords pricing power to grow rents in excess of inflation.”

The only property subsectors to record gains in the past month were timber (up 7.8 percent), lodging/resorts (up 2.0 percent) and manufactured homes (up 0.4 percent).

Regional mall REITs and office REITs