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Put up to four markets on the same ruler. The shapes do most of the explaining.

Market 1 Market 2 Market 3 Market 4

Residential property 59 Tough The shape most British households own without ever seeing it: heavily leveraged, slow to exit and expensive to hold.
Real estate investment trusts 22 Moderate Property's economics in a share's fingerprint: liquid and protected, but volatile in a way the buildings underneath are not.

	Residential property	Real estate investment trusts
Exit difficulty	5	2
Volatility	2	4
Leverage	4	2
Carry cost	4	1
Fraud risk	2	1
Protection gap	3	1
Barrier to entry	4	1
Expertise needed	3	3
Difficulty	59 Tough	22 Moderate
In a sentence	The asset most British households hold most of their wealth in, bought with borrowed money, sold over months, and priced by a process that can collapse at any point before exchange.	Listed companies that own property and pay out most of their rental profit untaxed at company level — property exposure with share-like liquidity.
Unit	One dwelling	One share
Smallest realistic trade	One property, or a share through fractional and REIT structures	One share
Settlement	Exchange of contracts then completion, typically 8–20 weeks	T+1

The fingerprint measures how demanding a market is to take part in. It is not a rating or a recommendation.