Larry Burkett (RIP) used to have a good comment when someone would tell him they couldn't pay off their house because they needed the mortgage deduction. Presume you are in a 20% effective tax bracket. Now presume (for ease of math) that you paid $1,000 in mortgage interest for the year. That means you sent $1,000 to the bank and received $200 of it back in the form of lower taxes. If you think that's a good deal I'll give you an even better one. Give me $1,000 and I'll return $900 immediately. No waiting until April 15 to file - nothing. You can have your $900 the same day.
There will also be less incentive to own your own home so I suspect being a landlord will be more profitable.
The only reason I ever bought a house was so I would know I could not be evicted. It never had to do with the asset value of the house, or the relative value of the mortgage interest and the stock earnings, or the relative cash flow of paying rent to paying a mortgage, or tax incentives, or any of that stuff. If you own it, it's yours. I think most people who buy homes agree. I could be wrong, though.
Shalom.
I agree with Larry on this one. And I rent because I choose to! My son owns rental property and he also rents the place he lives!
However, again, we are talking about the unwashed masses. My wife and I have both been real estate agents and still have quite a few friends in the business. Believe me, one of the major factors, stupid though it is, regarding home ownership is the tax deductibility in your loan. And most people are looking at well over 10K a year.
The reason I rent, btw, is that I like the freedom. I owned my own home for 20 years and I love being able to move at will. I have lived at five different locations in the last seven years. It is a blast!