[oldpersonintx2]

"Not retiring" in the US will be more dictated by inability to purchase a home than Social Security.

Look at all these people around you in their forties who are still renting. They are basically too late to buy. They will be "forever renters". This means they will have to work until death, as their rents continue to rise when their peers who owned homes took their downsizing premium and lived off of it for a few years.

What's crazy is the number of grown adults who think their 401ks will magically grow to fill the gap.

[pengaru]

Housing in the US isn't anywhere near as cost prohibitive as a vocal minority of people like to make it sound like it is.

You just have to give up on the Santa Monicas, San Franciscos, and Manhattans of the nation. There's plenty of affordable housing outside the top tier cities, and modern tech has made it easier than ever to work from practically anywhere on the planet.

The only people in their 40s I know of who are still renting that I would consider "forever renters" are being extraordinarily undisciplined with their finances and spend what they could be saving towards a down payment on credit card debt they self-inflicted.

[IndubitableCoil]

I hear this sentiment frequently but it doesn't pencil out. Renting an equivalent unit will typically, month-to-month, be cheaper than buying. Of course a significant portion of the monthly mortgage payment goes to principal which increases your net worth, but there are many cases where the money you save monthly by renting will actually exceed the principal you accumulate from your mortgage payment. In fact, there are plenty of helpful calculators to help you figure out what makes the most sense if you don't have a love affair with Excel [1].

You may argue that the the value of the house will appreciate well in a good market, but there is nothing stopping you from taking the money you saved by renting and putting it in an appreciating asset.

[1] https://www.nerdwallet.com/calculator/rent-vs-buy-calculator

[ajxs]

Where do I input the yearly growth of the property's value? Property prices where I live in Sydney have grown ~7% on average over the last ten years. That's higher than the average loan interest rate over the last ten years of ~4.5%. It's possible to find some other investment that earns more than ~7% profit, but in order to really be more profitable it would also need to cover the amount you spent in rent over that period.

[dehrmann]

The only real financial benefit to home ownership is it enforces savings.

[oldpersonintx2]

the rent vs buy calculator does not tell me what to do when I am in my 60s and cannot find work

a homeowner in that scenario can sell their home; a renter is in trouble

[dw_arthur]

You can still find plenty of reasonable housing in the US. As for young people on the coasts, yea I don't know how they will own a house within the next 10 years.