What you will notice if you play around with it is that the decision is most sensitive to "What Does the Future Hold", in particular to the home price growth rate. If you expect that to even stabilize (let alone decline) then renting is almost always a better deal.
Now, that being said, I expected home prices to stabilize back in the early 2000's and didn't buy in SF, so I have been fooled before.
That's true, but future prices and rents are very difficult to know. If you buy, your costs, ex-property taxes are known for the rest of your life.
This means you can customize the house for your needs, make friends, have you kids make friends, join community organizations, etc, without having to worry that one day when you go to renew your lease, your landlord will have an unaffordable surprise for you, and you have to give up everything you've built up.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/upshot/buy-rent-cal...
What you will notice if you play around with it is that the decision is most sensitive to "What Does the Future Hold", in particular to the home price growth rate. If you expect that to even stabilize (let alone decline) then renting is almost always a better deal.
Now, that being said, I expected home prices to stabilize back in the early 2000's and didn't buy in SF, so I have been fooled before.