I'm in the same boat (or, house...boats are not great investments)

The justifications/case for home ownership can often be over-hyped. Everything works out well in a rising market. When shit hits the fan, sure my landlord can raise my rent, but I can move to another city for a better job with a very minimal hit. The stock market has created higher long term gains than the real estate market and is a hell of a lot more liquid.

The fact that people say your house is an "asset" is abuse of the definition and IMHO drives people to buy more house than they need. Sure it's an asset, but you also live there. Your liquidity is greatly reduced and your options become very limited.

Rental properties are another story. If you know what you're doing and can afford it, then I don't see issues with using that as an investing strategy. Just maybe don't buy all of them in the same city, or the same type of property. Just like with stocks and side hustles, diversification is important.

Ditto. And in this crisis, they're suspending evictions and presumably suspending mortgage payments too. I feel very lucky to have gotten out of that chain. Now I'm renting and fairly comfortable compared to the much larger structure I used to own which included land (now I'm in a one bedroom condo). I just wish I could drill a pull-up bar and TV articulating arm into the wall.

However, I'm able to rent and live in a much nicer area than where I could afford to buy.

I recently moved to Berlin, and the whole rental market here is awesome. Rent controls mean the rents aren't huge (but they are rising because of the high demand). But the amazing thing (to someone from UK/Australia anyway) is that I can repaint, make alterations, drill holes in the walls, etc. I might have to put it back the way it was at the end, but the landlord can't stop me from doing what I like to the place while I'm here. A whole different attitude to renting.

> I might have to put it back the way it was at the end, but the landlord can't stop me from doing what I like to the place while I'm here. A whole different attitude to renting.

This is the same in the US, FWIW. Most landlords aren't going to care what you do, as long as you don't damage common areas and return it in mint conditoin.

Nah, it depends on the building rules. There's no such law. In my building you need to give a deposit just to install curtain rods, for example, or hang a TV.

I'm rather surprised; the inabiilty to paint the walls or put up pictures or have pets? The knowledge that you might have to leave at short notice?

I don't have pets - I'm not able to commit to 10+ years of being able to look after them, so I don't have them. This isn't due to renting, but due to me being bored with places easily.

I can paint the walls, put up pictures (Berlin has better rules than UK/Australia). Not that I do when I can.

I've only been evicted a couple of times, and even then I wanted to move anyway so it was convenient. It's usually me/us moving on and the landlord annoyed that they have to find a new tenant.

And don't forget the wonderful bonus of anything that goes wrong being someone else's problem. Roof leaking? Phone the landlord. Rising damp? Phone the landlord. Mold problems? Neighbours building a new fence? Frost damage to the pathway? Pipes frozen? Window cracked? All not my problem.