Fundrise Real Estate Investment Trusts Review

Investment options

Fundrise offers four portfolio types. Its Starter plan is the best place for new investors to begin because it has a low minimum deposit and it gives you a chance to get your feet wet with a balanced e-Real Estate Investment Trust (eREIT) to decide if it's right for you. Once you've invested at least $1,000 with Fundrise, you can upgrade for free to one of its Core Plans. More experienced real estate investors who would like to begin with one of these plans right away have the option to do so.

Its Supplemental Income plan offers a steady stream of dividends so you can reap the benefits of real estate investing right now rather than waiting years or decades, though your total return may not be as high as someone who invested for the long term. At the opposite end of the spectrum is the Long-Term Growth plan. This offers fewer dividends to investors now, but it promises greater appreciation and larger returns overall. Then, there's the Balanced Growth plan, which falls in the middle of the other two, giving you some of the benefits of each.

Fundrise doesn't give investors the opportunity to choose specific pieces of real estate they would like to invest in, but all of their funds are well diversified and with four different plans available, most investors should find something that appeals to them.

Fees

Fundrise charges a 0.85% annual asset management fee, plus a 0.15% annual investment advisory fee. The latter may be waived under certain circumstances, though the company's website does not disclose under what circumstances that may happen. Still, Fundrise's combined fees are a lot lower than the fees on many traditional investments you can purchase through brokerage firms. There's also a 0% to 2% asset origination/acquisition fee, which is about comparable to the origination fees many brokerages charge their customers.

Fundrise is pretty transparent about its fees, but if you have any questions about them or how you can get your investment advisory fee waived, you should reach out to Fundrise  for more information.

Accessibility

You can easily access your account at any time through Fundrise's website or through its highly rated mobile app if you have an Apple iPhone or iPad. There is no mobile app for Android users at this time, but you can still access its mobile site from your phone's web browser to access your account that way.

Fundrise also has pretty reasonable minimum deposits, so you don't need a ton of money to use the platform. You can open a Starter plan with just $500 and then upgrade to one of its Core Plans for free as soon as you've invested at least $1,000. As with any investment, larger deposits lead to larger potential returns, but it's nice that Fundrise lets you start with so little. Those who want to invest in real estate but don't have a lot of extra cash and those who are new to real estate investing and just want to play with a small amount of money at first will find a home here.

Educational resources

Fundrise maintains a resources section containing real estate investment advice for all skill levels. Those who are new to real estate investing should begin with the Real Estate Investing 101 articles while those with a little more experience may move straight to the Advanced Investing section. There aren't a ton of help articles at present, but this will likely grow over time. You can use these articles to give you a basic understanding of what you're investing in and head to other sites on the internet to fill in the gaps if you need to.