They’re still strong picks to tap real estate

Article Excerpt

The pace of new real estate development continues to accelerate as the COVID-19 pandemic eases. Here are two stocks that will let investors profit from this trend. RIOCAN REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST $20 is a buy. The REIT (Toronto symbol REI.UN; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Units outstanding: 309.9 million; Market cap: $6.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 5.3; Distribution yield: 5.1%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.riocan.com) owns all or part of 204 shopping centres and other properties, as well as 13 projects under development. Its occupancy rate is a high 97.0%. RioCan announced a new strategy in October 2017 to boost investor value. The biggest part of that plan was for it to concentrate on six major urban markets: Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver. The trust also continues to diversify beyond retail properties—in the first quarter of 2022, office and residential properties supplied roughly 10% of its rental revenue. One of those new properties is The Well, a major mixed-use project in downtown Toronto…