see in the town where I live, 90,000 population, rental properties are scarce, esp decent ones, esp ones for families, no incentive here because of government interference etc, long story, so often you can buy a decent house and the mortage even with taxes and interest will be the same as or sometimes less than rent, but if you can't scrape together the downpayment, and the government even loosened up those rules lately, not sure if that was wise, as in you can now borrow your downpayment, I remember what happened in 1981 when that was going on or people had only put 5% down on their houses, when interest rates hit 21% in Canada, people just walked away from their houses, often with the furniture still in it, those were hideous times......now you have to have special mortage insurance if you have less than 25 per cent downpayment, not cheap either.....
In our area in Riverside CA it's becoming somewhat of a renters market. A $375,000 home is renting for $1500 and you can't make payments, taxes and insurance for that. Even on an interest only.