You could be a landlord for Amazon, FedEx and Walmart with these REITs that net up to a 4.4% yield — you can even collect on a monthly basis – msnNOW

Being a landlord is one of the oldest ways to earn a passive income. And these days, you don’t have to buy a house to get a piece of the action.

Check out real estate investment trusts, which are publicly traded companies that own income-producing real estate.

REITs collect rent from their properties and pass it along to shareholders in the form of dividends. That means investors don’t have to worry about screening tenants, fixing damages or chasing down late payments. Instead, they simply sit back and enjoy the dividend checks rolling in when they pick a winning REIT.

Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic did impact some commercial real estate. And not all REITs are the same. If you are a landlord for e-commerce giant Amazon, for instance, you should have no problem collecting a steady stream of rental income.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at two REITs paying oversized dividends to investors — one could be worth pouncing on with some of your extra cash.

Amazon’s landlord

The first one is STAG Industrial (STAG), a REIT that owns and operates single-tenant industrial properties throughout the U.S. Its biggest tenant is Amazon.

The company’s portfolio consists of 517 buildings totaling approximately 103 million rentable square feet across 40 states.

Note that 434 of the 517 properties are warehouses, which happen to be an essential part of e-commerce.

Moreover, a tenant survey in 2020 revealed that around 40% of the REIT’s portfolio handles e-commerce activity.

To see how solid STAG Industrial is, take a look at its dividend history.

Since the company went public in 2011, it has paid a higher dividend every single year.

While most dividend-paying companies follow a quarterly distribution schedule, STAG Industrial pays shareholders every month. The monthly dividend rate stands at 12.08 cents per share, which translates to an annual yield of 3.2%.

STAG Industrial shares are up 50% year to date. If you don’t feel comfortable picking individual stocks in this elevated market, you can always build a diversified passive income portfolio automatically just by investing your spare change.