”60% monthly salary on a mortgage"

I think everyone would agree that that is not financial freedom, but it's commonly accepted and taught that your rent/mortgage shouldn't be more than 30% of your take home.

That was my poorly made point, indeed... It can be more sensible from a financial freedom point of view to rent at 30% of take-home pay than mortgage at 60%.

for some people that 30% is literally impossible in a major city

Around here a mortgage plus taxes is quite a bit less than rent for a comparable square footage and year of construction. Rent should be more than mortgage as you are paying your landlord's mortgage plus the overhead of renting it out. Even if your landlord has held the property for a long time, they should take out new mortgages and invest the money rather than let it sit idle. There are some markets where the demand to rent is not coupled to the demand to buy, but this highly atypical.

> Having to pay >60% of monthly salary

I moved to a MCOL city where my mortgage is <20%. my salary