REIT Calculator

Real estate investment trusts reward patient, income-minded investors, and seeing how a position might compound over time helps you judge whether your allocation is pulling its weight toward goals on the horizon. The projection here layers in dividend reinvestment (DRIP) and rising future payouts so you can read both the income stream and the total return your holdings could generate.

A compounding model drives the numbers. Your investment buys shares at the price you enter, and in year one each share pays the dividend yield times that price. The dividend growth rate then lifts the per-share payout every following year, so the income figures build on themselves rather than staying flat. The calculator runs two versions side by side: without DRIP you keep the original shares and collect the cash, and with DRIP each year's distributions buy more shares at that year's closing price. The share price is assumed to rise 3% a year in both versions; that rate is fixed in the calculator, not an input.

Bear in mind that what a REIT did before tells you nothing certain about what it will do next, and both dividend growth and price appreciation here are assumptions, not promises. Aggressive growth inputs produce flattering but unreliable forecasts, so conservative figures give you a steadier read. Factor in the taxes owed on dividends as well, since they trim the amount actually available to reinvest.