I got the data from here: https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/historical-asset-class-returns, and according to their site they use VGSIX for the historical REIT returns.

Thanks Lin! Glad you enjoyed the visual 🙂

Thank you! I appreciate the kind words. I think data visualizations are a great way to simplify lots of numbers into easy-to-digest charts.

You make a good point Dom – since this analysis assumes you invest the same amount at one fixed time point (2000), it can be a bit misleading. I’m looking at doing another analysis that includes dollar cost averaging to see how things shook up if investors had invested consistently each year. Thanks for the feedback!

The U.S. stock market really got crushed in 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2008, which explains the sub-par performance. For a longer time horizon (like if data started in 1990), the performance of stocks would look much better.

I was also surprised at how well REITs performed over the years, and I share your sentiment for enjoying REIT yields. It offers a nice income stream no matter how the market is behaving.

Gotta love them realty classes esp in market volatilities like these days. At least if everything went to hell I still got a roof for me and my family to live under.

I wouldn’t had guessed that REITS were the best performing asset class. But I guess it makes sense given the dot com bust, 9/11, and then the great financial crisis.

I wonder what this means next 17 years?

The one thing that is misleading about this kind of view is that it doesn’t show what investors actually earned because it can’t. But if you accept that most people are dollar cost averaging into investments actual returns can/will deviated greatly from these returns.

Thoughts?

Dom