Over the past 22 months, real estate investment trusts (REITs) have been decimated as high inflation, Federal Reserve interest rate hikes, declines in tenant occupancy, war and the threat of a hard-landing recession have impacted these stocks significantly. The peak for REITs was on Dec. 31, 2021. The Vanguard Real Estate Index Fund ETF (NYSE:VNQ), which tracks the performance of the MSCI US REIT Index, touched a high of $109.09 that day, but it's been downhill ever since. Its total return, incl