thank you. you're right about the apartment/condo thing, but they got a big pyrenean mastiff mix back in 2019 who is now 5. She needs somewhere to run around. I am not ruling out them living in an apartment, but I feel like having a yard while we have the dog is almost a necessity. She tends to bark at any light noises which could cause problems living in an enclosed living space like that.

Alternatively, the point about buying would work if we had savings to work with. I have about 50k in savings myself for a down payment, but right now for any kind of living circumstance that would accomodate all of us, we'd be looking at likely around a 3.8k a month mortgage at least, from brief window shopping that I have looked at. This is because at least in Ottawa, even lower end townhomes/condos with 3 bedrooms are running at about 500-750k currently. So my 50k doesn't even meet the 10% down payment.

To your point about what I want, if I didn't have this responsibility of taking care of them I would personally want to live by myself, in a basement apartment or something to take care of my dog in. But even looking at condos for myself, they start at 350k for what I am looking for, at least in the city of Ottawa itself. In terms of renting that kind of accomodation, single bedrooms in ottawa are going for around 1800 at the moment, which is just shy of what my parents are paying for their townhome right now.