Green acres - Funds - investing in real estate funds - Brief Article

Real estate. Whether it comes in the form of dirt, shopping malls or apartment complexes, it's the stuff we love to own--and it's been known to reward some investors. If owning property outright isn't your thing, real estate funds just might be.

Look down Lipper's roster of fund types, and real estate funds are one of the few offering their investors plus-side returns this year. At the end of the third quarter, the average performing fund in that category was up 3.03 percent--not too shabby considering the overall stock market. At the top of the real estate performance list is the Alpine Realty Income and Growth fund. Through October 1, the fund was up 13.41 percent; for the past three years, its average annual total return was 19.86 percent.

So what makes this fund so special? First, it's value-oriented. Portfolio manager Bob Gadsden likes to find undervalued and overlooked companies. Second, because it's a small fund, with about $35 million in assets, Gadsden can take a position in companies that can pay off handsomely for the fund. And third, the fund's not wed to following any particular model or index.

On the downside, real estate funds--like other sector funds--perform in cycles. Many variables make it hard to call the future, so most pros say keep asset allocations in them in the 5 to 20 percent range.

The Young Men's Women's Real Estate Association is pleased to announce it raised and donated $7,200 towards Habitat for Humanity of NYC

Caption: The Young Men's Women's Real Estate Association is pleased to announce it raised and donated $7,200 towards Habitat for Humanity of NYC. In addition, two dozen YMWREA members (pictured above) volunteered at a job site on 237 W. 134th Street in Harlem, during the summer, to rehabilitate an existing five-story building to provide ten new homes. Each unit will have a large living room, full kitchen, full bath and laundry facilities. It was especially meaningful for YM/WREA to help provide assistance for much needed affordable housing to local families. For more information about donating, please contact Judith Werner at (718)

Meyers Group launches web site - Meyers Group Real Estate Information L.L.C., introduces www.meyersgroup.com

The Meyers Group, one of the nation's largest providers of housing information and consulting services, announced today the official launch of their new Web site, www.meyersgroup.com.

Designed to help those interested in monitoring the new home building and housing markets throughout the United States, the site has a number of valuable reports for immediate download, as well as free analysis on economic and housing market conditions. Through an advanced scalable application infrastructure built by The Meyers Group, site visitors can query the company's proprietary data warehouse, which contains over 1,000 different data fields on 1.9 million new homes and more than 20,000 subdivisions across the country.

Meyersgroup.com is divided into three key real estate information categories, each focusing on a specific aspect of the nation's housing market. In each area, users can peruse a wealth of relevant housing market information and analysis. Meyersgroup.com's three areas include:

Housing Information -- allows users to order custom reports on specific projects or geographic regions.

Housing Analysis -- offers a series of analytical reports that monitor and forecast housing market conditions.

My Markets -- allows registered users the opportunity to monitor housing market conditions on their markets, including average single-family new home sales prices, annualized new home sales for the region, the number of active projects in the area, and the weeks of speculative inventory.