Nobody said anything about ignoring housing costs, that would be silly. What you are really comparing is "equity from long term investment - cost of rental" v

Nobody said anything about ignoring housing costs, that would be silly. What you are really comparing is "equity from long term investment - cost of rental" vs "equity in house - operating costs - cost of financing". Clearly if for functionally equivalent housing (for you) you can rent for enough lower than you would pay to maintain and pay for a house, and the investment returns are high enough, rental wins. The break even point is different in different locations and housing brackets, but it's always there. And often it's impossible to compare directly as your access to rental and purchased housing may look quite different in a given area. So yes, lots of people have run the numbers. When they do it properly, they always come up with "it depends". The US is unusual in tax benefit for mortgage payments, which often bends things in that direction, but there are still definitely situations where renting can win. It's also rather careless to assume homogeneity of an populations needs like "over 45", everyone is different. Someone with 3 teenage kids will have different parameters than a single person post-divorce, etc. What you are correct about is that housing has worked as a retirement strategy for people who haven't planned - but that doesn't mean it's the best strategy.