This is okay as long as you are in one of the locations where mortgage is roughly equal to rent. In some places it’s closer to double, unless you want a 100 year mortgage.
Our calculated repayment on a 20 year mortgage with a 300k down payment on the estimated CV of this house: $1370 NZD pw
Yep!
Beijing is a good example of a place where rents are way lower than sale prices, so you can totally wind up paying $1000/month to rent something that is on the market for $1 million.
I have a fixed 15 year loan at 2.75%, which seems like a pretty good deal to me. Know where I can borrow a few hundred thou at 1%?
Yes, sometimes buying makes sense, but sometimes renting makes sense as well.
Assuming we pay the same for mortgage and rent, who wouldn't want to pay rather mortgage?
But remember, to pay the same, there was a huge downpayment. If you were to invest that rationally, long term returns could be worth it, even while paying rent.
OTOH, rational investing (in a balanced fund portfolio) is hard, and mortgage forces you to save.
YMMV, do your math.
And then I definitely want to own my house before brexit, as an immigrant I will not risk not being able to rent if things go tits up.