<prompt> Human: NOTE: This is a repost of Hi, I was wondering if it would be more financially savvy to rent a room to live in for say 500month or buy a house by making a down payment, since Id only have about 10,000 to 15,000.I am only planning this from when I am 25 until I am 30. At age 30, I will probably by a moderate to small sized house.From what I understand, real estate rises, on average, 6 a year, while an index fund, such as one following the SP 500 e.g., VOO rises 9 per year. I am assuming that if I bought a house at 25 years old, I would be paying 1,200 per month to live in it. On the other hand, I could rent a room to live in for 500, and use the leftover money 700 to invest in an index fund that grows 9 per year.According to my calculations, if I went with buying a house at 25 and paid 1,200 per month for 5 years, it would amount to a total paid of 72000. If I went with renting for 500month, I would have 42000 to invest into an index fund. Now, in both cases, I am planning to leave the investment for about 35 years. So, if I left 72,000 grow at 6 per year for 35 years, it would grow to 522,073.82. If I rented a room, and invested the 42,000 into an index fund and let it sit for 35 years, it would grow to 786593.26.Therefore, it seems that I should be renting a room from the age of 25 until age 30.What do you guys think? Should I just bite the bullet and buy a home at 25 instead, or follow my renting strategy?NOTE: I am in Calgary, AB, CanadaAssistant: 6 and 9 are both wild over estimates. Real restate gains or losses are heavily dependent on market. Human: Even as a yearly average over 35 years?  <response>: Long term especially, 6 is a huge overestimate for capital gains in real estate. Even the bay area, an extraordinary market, has been closer to four. Most housing markets, adjusted for inflation are more like 1-2.However, you can also get rents from real estate. Including these, 6 is a more realistic figure, although I would guess more like 4-5. Markets, adjusted for inflation, are close to 7 including divideds. In both cases, especially for markets,theres a lot of year to year volatility. 