I used to live in an apartment then decided to buy a house for reasons such as wanting to have a yard / outdoor space (wanted to buy a big dog among others), leave city life for suburban life for peace & quiet, family-proof (place where I’d want hypothetical kids to grow up in), etc. After experiencing both I prefer house over apartment.
I don’t think I have much of a preference on apartment or house per se, but I want to live somewhere I own. I’ve spent too much of my life pissing a portion of each paycheck into the wind just to subsidize a landlord, and there’s no value retention once my lease is up.
The only apartments that are for sale in my area are all astronomically expensive, catering to mainly wealthy foreign investors and their rich shithead kids who come here for college. Condos are a bit cheaper, but many of them are ancient, falling apart, tiny, and still going for $800,000+, so I’ve been looking at houses outside of the city because that’s all I can really afford.
Even if it’s nothing fancy, it’d be mine. I’d be taking care of it and get whatever nice things I want for me, and not for the leech who owns the property and invests only the bare minimum.