In February 2019, Northstar’s board of directors reportedly performed a thorough analysis of the REIT’s business, financial condition, liquidity sources and capital needs, and believed that it was prudent to preserve capital and protect the company’s financial position, thus suspending all income distributions. With the income distributions suspended, some investors are standing to lose not only their monthly distributions, but also the principal they originally invested. According to studies, non-traded REITs have historically underperformed even safe benchmarks, like U.S. treasury bonds – meaning that non-traded REITs provide paltry investment returns considering the risk an investor takes. The NorthStar REIT is a high-risk investment that can be very volatile, which means that it is not suitable for every investor. However, due to the high commissions brokers earn on these products they sell them to investors who cannot profit from them. These products have become so popular among brokers without providing any benefit to investors that many states now limit investors from investing more than 10% of their liquid assets in non-traded REITs. Investment professionals who recommend unsuitable REITs may be subject to disciplinary action by FINRA or the Securities and Exchange Commission.