[hintklb]

you definitely came ahead by not buying and you did the math. Good for you!

Generally, this holds true today for most HCOL and MCOL areas. It is still a good idea to buy in a few LCOL areas.

What I have seen is that in high-earner areas (Bay area for example) buying completely outpaces renting in cost (buy to rent ratio_. Mainly because the pool of buyers outbid each other. This is mainly due to the narrative and social pressure to buy at all cost. Similarly, renting stays relatively low as people do not compete as much.

[Swizec]

> Generally, this holds true today for most HCOL and MCOL areas. It is still a good idea to buy in a few LCOL areas

We have friends who rent to live in SF and buy in LCOL as investment properties. Also seems to work well as a strategy.

I think of primary residence as a consumption expense. It's not really an investment because you can't cash out[1]. So unless you put value on the act of owning itself, it's best to do whatever gives you a lower monthly. In our case that's renting.

[1] yes I know about HELOCs. I'd rather get margin loans on index funds than risk getting kicked out of my home.

[hintklb]

I fully agree with you. I also think that there are as many good intangible argument for owning as for renting.

Renting allows you to be flexible for new opportunities. They allow you to focus on other things in life than your house, treat your landlord as a service provider, free your time to do more important things.

Frankly it is sad that as a society we value homeownership so highly and judge people that decide to rent so harshly.