Despite this slippage, the RMS, with a year-to-date gain of 12%, is well above the major equity indexes. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 7.8% for the same period, the S&P 500 is off 14.1% and the Nasdaq has fared the worst of the three with a loss of 26.9%.

In addition, after a month of substantial of net inflows to real estate mutual funds that, on occasion, surpassed the largest inflows in almost a year, for the week ending Aug. 29 net outflows totaled $19.1 million. At the same time, market values dipped to $12 billion, a loss of about $100 million.

The average dividend yield for the RMS rose last week from 6.63% to 6.76%, the spread over the S&P moved up from 534 basis points to 537 bps and the spread over the 10-year Treasury moved up from 170 bps to 193 bps.