Not everyone wants to own a house for investment reasons. House ownership appeals to a lot of people who want to have their own place in the world. My dad is a

Not everyone wants to own a house for investment reasons. House ownership appeals to a lot of people who want to have their own place in the world. My dad is a "builder" -- he barely finished high school and he's never had a non-labor job, but he is very good at designing and building all manner of things. In the 12 or so years he's lived in his current home, he has completely redone the kitchen (a couple times), took an open-area second floor and made three bedrooms and a bathroom out of it, added an addition (an indoor/outdoor backporch area) on the back, converted the old bathroom and backporch downstairs into a beautiful, much larger bathroom, and so on. And that's just in the house, not to mention other changes he's made on the property (fences, a new dog kennel, redone garage, landscaping, etc.). Some people just like to tinker, and when you don't own something, that's not really a possibility. After renting at my current residence for over a year, there are some things here that annoy me: we have no porch to speak of, we have a huge kitchen that is laid out horribly (not even a dishwasher), there is a nice basement that is just begging to be finished, and all the walls everywhere are white. It sure would be nice to have a place of my own where I could fix these "problems", both adding to the value and increasing my happiness, all without having to move. And there is just something satisfying about owning something, about working towards a common goal with someone you love, in building something together. When the area you live in is pliable to your wants and needs, happiness is just a little bit of hard work away.