For the record, I'm not unhappy at all, and if you'll look back at my original reply I was very up front about being just one data point. You can get lucky. Or

For the record, I'm not unhappy at all, and if you'll look back at my original reply I was very up front about being just one data point. You can get lucky. Or you can leverage insider knowledge. Or you can do some personal learning and invest wisely. All of these are equally applicable to investing in real estate or to investing in other things while being a renter. For some reason, however, those who profit from real estate are chalked up as lucky and those who profit from other things while renting seem to get to talk as if their success involved any less luck or any more informed investing. Why is this? In my case, I invested in a physical market in a particular region I had been watching for many years and which has generally steady indicators. I exited for entirely personal reasons (to live with my girlfriend, just to put it out there), not to "time" the market as claimed by one commenter who also claimed I got lucky. I was subsequently called out as unhappy by another - you. Again, why is this? Any argument that can be made for or against success by an owner can be made equally well for or against success by a renter investing elsewhere, yet luck only gets cast towards the former, wisdom only towards the latter, and all the while the latter never seem to publish any of their investment success numbers to match their claims of benefit down the road. Again, why the disparity? Whether in real estate or elsewhere, it's the same $500 per month during the same five years. Whether sourced from luck and/or expertise, why are one class of returns immediately disparaged while another goes entirely unstated yet entirely uncontested? I've never taken it as an offense personally, but do admit that it does seem to be a common pattern and not a particularly fair pattern, at that.