In the hopes this is helpful, I’d say the data strongly suggest that buying is better than renting in almost all circumstances.

Those who argue that renting is less expensive are either assuming they’d rent a much cheaper home than they’d buy (i.e., smaller and/or in a worse neighborhood), or are assuming that they are savvier about real estate than the landlords they’ll be renting from.

The former is possible, but IMO the latter is highly implausible.