In other words, it actually has an intrinsic value whereas the only intrinsic value of a commodity is the cost of extraction.I think emerging market ETFs are the logical diversification plan for people in developed countries with bleak prospects.

Diversification is a term usually applied to stock market/retirement investing but is something I want to apply to my income.  

I'm considering buying, rehabbing, renting properties as a diversification to our main business.

Gregory Hiban While I am not opposed to diversification, I wasn't trying to compare stocks vs REI. 

Just like in most investments, diversification is probably your smartest approach.

The idea of diversification is often used in order to avoid risk, but often results in failing to achieve return potential due to over diversification.If you've done your research and have conviction in your investment strategy and ability to execute, you should exploit that as much as you can, while guarding for risk however possible.  

I have the benefits of leverage, diversification (which for me, means that when I have a vacancy, I also have other rent funds coming in), and that snowball works quickly to pay down each house. 

Usually these leveraged and index funds are more geared for day trading. http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.asp...Personally I'd probably focus more on diversification if you are concerned about your current RE positions.  

(why it makes sense to be in 5 different markets)#1  Diversification - I have a friend who brought 8 (about half his portfolio) in one town, one provider and dealing with a lot of the headaches I'm experiencing with the same provider but in a larger scale.  

Having invested in over 1000+ units, I have expanded my pool of syndicators (a form of diversification) and typically look at the above criteria in addition to sensitivity analysis around interest rates and exit caps.