The age old question, is it better to buy or to rent? Well we can argue this till the end of time, however we will not arrive at any conclusion. What you should be asking yourself is. Is it better for you! To rent or buy, because only you can decide what would be best for you and your people, all I can do is give you another pro and con list.

As you know most of those out there have dreams of owning their own home! Feels like a sort of right of passage type thing. Well it might not be all that it is cracked up to be and depending on where you are in life you need to make a decision that is right for you. Let’s get something clear, there is no problem with renting! I guess I should say that there is no problem with not owning. Heck! If I was a single man with no children or pets, I would most likely be traipsing along the countryside in a van! But, living in a van is a story for another day.

Owning is awesome! 

Owning a home can be great! Like for instance you get to build this beautiful thing called equity! This essentially means that you get a portion of your rent payments back when you sell the house. Meaning the difference between how much your house is worth compared to how much you owe on it. 

Generally speaking it is a good place to invest your money. Especially, if you are looking to try your hand at the rental game, or something along those lines. 

Some would argue that it is relatively stable, you don’t have to worry about the landlord hiking the rent. That argument is pretty weak! I feel the bigger concern would be asking you to leave for the sale of the property or the landlord’s family member needing it. Rent hikes aren’t really a thing in Ontario, however market rents are very high depending where you are looking.

Owning has crushed my soul… 

It isn’t without its drawbacks though. One of them being that you can’t just pack up and move out. You are committed to having to deal with this property unlike a rental where you can give your notice and leave this one requires a little more work to dispose of. 

And did I mention the amount of money you will be paying for the maintenance and upkeep of your property. No more landlord to call when you have a problem that’s right it’s on you same as those darn property taxes. 

Why own, when you can rent! 

Don’t let your old man tell you that you have to own a house to amount to anything in your life. There are other options and with some pretty awesome perks, like the simple fact that although payment tends to roughly be pretty close to each other you can sometimes score the utility payments and other costs right into your rent payment making it a cheaper option. 

You see it a lot now especially during a pandemic. More People are working from home than ever before meaning that they are no longer tied to a location. Want to work from France or maybe Uruguay? You can have flexibility when you’re renting especially with short term types of rentals.

And the best thing that I feel renting brings to the table, is the “not my problem” attitude! What a great feeling, “not my problem” can be. Toilet exploded or pipes froze, oh mister landlord could you be a dear and fix this for me? That being said, there are some terrible landlords out there and what you feel would be the correct fix might not always be what they think would be correct. 

Leading us into some of the not so greats… 

One being that all the rent money is gone! No equity for you, stay at a place for ten years and that is close to $120,000 in rent that has just vanished, poof, gone. Never to be seen again.

Landlords, right! Some of them are just god awful at literally everything that they do. But they are the boss, and getting anything sorted out usually ends up requiring a judge at the good landlord tenant board. 

Also keep in mind it isn’t your place. So if the landlord’s deadbeat son needs a place to live, sorry you are out (in some cases) or maybe new owners just want it for themselves, it happens. Being at the mercy of the property owner can sometimes suck, especially if you have been there a long time and are uprooting your family. 

Like I mentioned in the beginning of this, buying or renting is not a matter of being better or worse. You just have to look at what is best for you, if you have the money and are planning on staying put for a while, then buy! If you want to travel the world and invest all your money in penny stocks, then rent! I can’t promise that no one will judge you for your decision, but know that I wont and those people that do are what’s wrong with the world. 

Keep in mind living in a van is also a great option like a really good one, and if you go that route, please post it on YouTube so I can live vicariously through you.