You're right, of course, but in the last 5 to 10 years, that hasn't helped most buyers who both need a house and can afford it.
The snowball effect of real estate fees and increased tax assesment is a fatal flaw in that argument. The get rich quick folk artificially increase the price of all available housing. Else how do you explain the outrageous prices of falling apart non-rehabs?
I’d say most of it was supply and demand.
When the demand was “normal”, ie, not propped up by people who have no business getting a home loan chasing properties,
you didn’t see the outrageous “appreciation” of property values.