I tell people all the time that they shouldn't consider buying their family home an "investment".
Yes, you can make money off owning a house, but my main objective when I bought a home was a place to live and raise my family. Never did I consider my house an investment!
Buying a house is just the beginning. There is so much maintenance and upkeep to do. When it comes to maintenance, you either have to pay someone or do the work yourself. Doing it yourself keeps the cost of ownership much lower.
From the very beginning of owning a house, I have learned each and every task myself. Not only was it much more inexpensive doing it myself, but I learned a great deal. While it was less expensive doing it myself, the cost was still not cheap.
The only way I would consider a house an investment was an investment in "education". I learned to learn as I had never done these jobs before.
With the money I saved, I invested that in stocks. Stocks don't require the same high amount of maintenance a home does. That is where the investment returns are to be made!
The long term return on stocks has completely outstripped the returns on houses I owned.
