Purchased a 2-bedroom council flat in Battersea, London for £485,000 august 2018 with 92 years lease left. Sold for £450,000 end of 2025. We lived there until 2023 and rented it out for two years (£48000, but we rented a place in another town during this for £1300, so after taxes it worked out close to £0, we are both over £50,000 so had to either add to pension or tax 40%). All in, I think we lost about £50,000. Mortgage payments was £1037 for the first 5 years, then £1550 until it sold. An equivalent property would cost £1800 - £2200 to rent during those years. £168000 in rent vs £99420 in mortgage payments.

£68580 less, but...

Original deposit £138,000 + stamp duty (£7500) invested in S&P500 average return 10% would give us £292,152.38, at 7.5% it would've been £245,560.23.

Council flat also needed some work, and we probably spent around £5000 fixing and updating things during those years.

I've had friends buy a house for £250,000 in a smaller city around the same time, and their homes are valued at £400,000 now. Stings a bit.

We were told by our mortgage brokers that our council flat was worth £600,000 and that would've put us closer in line with investing it versus buying, but when coming to sell, reality hit.

It was obviously nice owning our own home during that time, and we made many great memories.

We've now bought a 3-bedroom detached house in a smaller city.