I can’t say I believe in this because first of all, not everyone can actually afford this in the long run. I don’t know about you but I don’t have tens of thousands to short my family at the sale of my home! I NEED that equity and in the process of selling one home recently by focusing on every extra thousand we could get, it gave us the equity to purchase our next home in cash AND a new vehicle we desperately needed with a new baby. If I hadn’t, the rises in inflation and gas without the equity would have left me with no extra cash for either at all. That’s not a position I ever want to put my children in. Remember too, most people on Instagram talking about design and DIY are paid routinely by brands to keep doing rooms over in their home and design aesthetics so preaching that message is more about their wallet than yours. They’re in fact doing it for the money and so should you. Real estate is specifically about putting your money in a smart position to grow and purchase home after home with the same cash as you did your first!

Should you make a house a home to your desires? Of course! Just be careful about doing it cheaply, wrong, removing bedrooms and bathrooms that siphon up to $25k every time you do that from resale, worse in a down market, and make sure the work you do is quality that combines beauty and functionality. It can be uniquely you but also easy to convert to lots of equity when your family is in need of an upgrade for more square footage, perhaps a nursery for another baby on board, or to get some cash at sale for when you become empty nesters and need to send kids to college! Be smart with your money because ultimately that’s what a house is. Otherwise, rent is your best option and makes most financial sense.

Unless you do in fact have tens of thousands you don’t need anyway.