So, by that rationale, almost everyone with a mortgage is "broke"? Because, generally (except in recent times where money is cheap to borrow), you get a mortgage when you don't have the cash to buy a house outright (and probably won't for decades).
On the other hand, it's very very hard to calculate e.g. net "student loan value" (i.e. future earnings - future loan payments) - in fact, many people took out huge student loans but found themselves making way less income than they expected (hoped for)! Unfortunately, lenders don't care about that, becaue the government guarantees the loan...
(Of course, it did so only after first producing a lot of negative net worth homeowners out of people who were positive net worth homeowners, so its not clear where the net effect is.)
An asset is a house, a liability is a morgage. Taking out a morgage doesn't effect your net worth because while you add a liability you also add an asset that counteracts that liability.
Your first goal to financial security, if not a positive net worth, should be ensuring you have enough padding in your savings to handle unpredictable events like loss of job.