For the Landlord Who Manages Three Rentals and Is Done: 3 ETFs That Pay You to Sell and Keep the Income

You have painted enough hallways, chased enough late rent checks, and coordinated enough plumbers at 11 p.m. Three doors sounded manageable when you closed on the last one. Now it feels like a second job you never applied for. The good news: you can list the properties, cash out, and still collect checks, just through a brokerage account instead. Three ETFs do most of the heavy lifting: Schwab U.S. REIT ETF (NYSEARCA:SCHH), iShares Residential and Multisector Real Estate ETF (NYSEARCA:REZ), and Vanguard Global ex-U.S. Real Estate ETF (NASDAQ:VNQI).

Selling triggers real tax friction, including capital gains and depreciation recapture, so talk to a CPA before you list. What follows is how each fund fits the after-sale portfolio.

SCHH: Broad U.S. REIT Exposure Without the 2 A.M. Phone Calls

SCHH holds the biggest names in American commercial and residential real estate through one ticker. Top positions include Welltower at roughly 10.6% of net assets, Prologis at about 8.6%, Digital Realty Trust at around 4.5%, Simon Property Group at approximately 4.8%, and Equinix at about 4.1%. The shift in the top five is worth noting: Welltower has grown its share significantly as it completed over $15 billion in pro rata gross investments in the first half of 2026 alone, while Digital Realty has displaced American Tower in the upper ranks. The portfolio still spans apartments, single-family rentals, industrial and logistics, retail, self-storage, healthcare, data centers, office, hotels, timberland, and manufactured housing, so you swap concentration risk in three neighborhoods for exposure to more than 120 properties spread across the country.

For landlords considering the residential angle, SCHH does hold residential REITs including Invitation Homes, AvalonBay Communities, Equity Residential, and American Homes 4 Rent among its holdings. On income, SCHH pays quarterly, with a trailing 12-month distribution of roughly $0.67 per share. Assets under management have grown to approximately $11.5 billion, a meaningful increase from earlier in the year. At a recent price near $23.45, shares are up about 14.4% year to date, with a one-year return of around 13.7%.

REZ: The Closest Public Match to Your Rental Portfolio

If SCHH is your diversified anchor, REZ is the fund that most resembles what you already own. It tilts toward residential landlords, senior housing operators, and self-storage, the kinds of tenants and buildings you understand from firsthand experience. It carries a net expense ratio of 0.48%, meaning you keep roughly $9,952 of every $10,000 working for you each year.

The income arrives on a quarterly schedule with variable amounts. The annualized forward distribution runs about $2.03 per share. At a recent price near $93.25, REZ is up approximately 14.7% year to date and about 14.4% over the past year. Over the past decade, the fund has returned roughly 97.7% before dividends, reflecting the long-term compounding power of residential real estate even when the sector moves through rate cycles.

VNQI: Rent From Landlords You Will Never Meet

Your three properties are in one country, likely one city. VNQI fixes that concentration. It holds real estate operators outside the United States, spreading your income across markets that do not move in lockstep with U.S. rates or U.S. housing policy. The fund carries a lean expense ratio of 0.12% and holds more than 750 securities, with Japanese and Australian property companies among its largest positions.

VNQI pays once a year, and the checks are lumpy. The most recent distribution, paid December 23, 2025, was $2.1561 per share, up from $2.0404 the prior year. Longer term, annual payouts have swung widely, from $0.2353 in 2022 to $2.8949 in 2021. Total return has softened in 2026: shares are down roughly 4.4% year to date, compared with the modest decline reported earlier in the year, at a recent price near $44.84. Assets under management stand at approximately $3.8 billion. The trade here is geographic diversification, not near-term price appreciation.

Trade-Offs to Weigh Before You List

Public REITs are not a clean swap for a rent check. Prices move daily with interest rates and equity markets, so the value of your income stream will bounce in ways a signed 12-month lease never did. Distributions vary quarter to quarter (especially for REZ and VNQI), and you lose the depreciation shield and 1031 optionality that direct ownership provides. Selling three rentals in a single tax year can also produce capital gains and depreciation recapture consequences worth mapping with a CPA before you sign a listing agreement.

The upside is real: you keep the asset class, gain diversification across property types and geographies, and never touch a wrench again. The checks keep arriving without anyone selling shares to fund them, which is the whole idea behind a dividend ladder (we laid out how to build one in a free guide here: Never Touch the Principal).

Editor’s note: This article was updated to reflect current ETF data as of September 2026, including SCHH’s assets under management growth to approximately $11.5 billion, revised year-to-date and one-year return figures for all three funds, an updated top-holdings lineup for SCHH (Welltower now leads at roughly 10.6%, with Digital Realty Trust displacing American Tower in the top five), REZ’s revised 10-year return of approximately 97.7%, and VNQI’s steeper year-to-date decline of roughly 4.4% alongside confirmation of its 0.12% expense ratio.

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