History
REITs were created in the United States when President Eisenhower signed into law the REIT Act title contained in the Cigar Excise Tax Extension of 1960. REITs were created by Congress in order to give all investors the opportunity to invest in large-scale, diversified portfolios of income-producing real estate in the same way they typically invest in other asset classes – through the purchase and sale of liquid securities.
Since then, more than 20 countries around the world have established REIT regimes, with more countries in the works. The spread of the REIT approach to real estate investment around the world has also increased awareness and acceptance of investing in global real estate securities.
A comprehensive index for the REIT and global listed property market is the FTSE EPRA/NAREIT Global Real Estate Index Series, which was created jointly in October 2001 by the index provider FTSE Group, the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts (NAREIT) and the European Public Real Estate Association (EPRA).
As of mid-2012, the global index included 414 public real estate companies from 37 countries representing an equity market capitalization of about $1 trillion (with approximately 68% of that total from REITs).
Read more about this topic: Real Estate Investment Trust
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