You'll get ripped off. New homes depreciate quite a bit because of the ongoing cost of maintenance after 7-16 years. (Except in the Bay Area.) The catch is that inflation usually hides the depreciation.
You will find this out if you ever compare the cost of a new home to an older home, or plan to build your own. Where I live, a 15-20 year old home is about 60-80% of the cost of a similar new home.
Yeah I hear you. I'm not speaking of buying a new home in today's world. I'm speaking of a hypothetical world where homes weren't priced as investments, they were priced as products.
> homes weren't priced as investments, they were priced as products
Careful there, you really need to understand the difference between an investment and a product.
I bought a very nice lawn tractor as an "investment" so I wouldn't have to pay someone to mow my lawn.
The land your home is on is always an investment. Land doesn't depreciate like a product does.
But even then, when you use the term investment, I think you conflate "for profit" versus better deal. A home can be an investment as long as you have a tangible benefit over renting. That can be anything from lower long-term cost, to having the exact kind of living space you want.
For example: I owned a home for a little over 3 years before I had to move. We sold it for inflation + cost of some improvements, and at the end it was slightly cheaper than renting... But we enjoyed the house so much more, and the house was in much better condition than a rental. We were able to do things like install an electric car charger and central air conditioning; things that would be much more difficult in a rental situation.
You will find this out if you ever compare the cost of a new home to an older home, or plan to build your own. Where I live, a 15-20 year old home is about 60-80% of the cost of a similar new home.