He's right ... just "leasing" until the eminent domain carpetbaggers come knocking.
That is so very like what my father told me many, many years ago. His theory was; you really don’t own your house, or the property it sits on, because you have to pay property taxes. And when you don’t, the State (I mean this in the classical term, ie., the government) will confiscate it from you. Ergo, the State actually owns your house/property, and the property taxes you pay is your rent. Therefore, you, as a private citizen, only own your possesions (auto, lawnmower, Hummel figurines, et al).
I’ve pondered this point over the years, and I think my dad (RIP, 2008) was 100% right, in my opinion.
If you pay property tax you do not own property. You are just renting it from the government. If you miss a rent payment, the landlord will evict you and sell the property to someone who will pay the rent.
You do not even own your paycheck. The government seizes what they want first and gives you what is left over after they have taken their cut.
Even if you own property and pay on it for 100 years, it will not matter. Miss a rent payment to the government, and they will boot you off and take back ‘their’ land. Happens all the time.
The government also tries their very best to steal the land from the family once the owner dies.
We are not as far away from a Mexican form of government as many think we are.
Starting primarily with FDR, and getting much worse under Bushs, Clinton, Obama, this is just not America anymore. Everything, by default, belongs to the government. Whether or not they let you keep it is entirely up to them.