As far as condo buying one big thing to consider is special assessments. If you are the owner of record when a special assessment comes along that may make that "rent paying someone else's mortgage" argument fly out the window. In your situation I wouldn't look at buying a condo with a ten foot pole. The RE market has little chance of running up at this point with rising interest rates and increasing lending rules and jobs and wages aren't likely to get out of control any time soon. Rent and bide your time until you decide on where you really want to be. Then buy a place while in a strong bargaining position with your hoarded cash and no liabilities.
I own a place so not against RE ownership in any way shape or form but that "paying someone else's mortgage" line does bug me. Its is very misleading. I will say there are plenty of owners losing money renting in places like Calgary when you consider all the costs of owning a rental. Including mortgage financing, insurance, taxes, maintenance and upgrades, special assessments. Much like gamblers, you simply don't hear about the money losing stories when looking at RE. When a person sells that rental and calculates their "gains" how many factor in ALL the money they sunk into that place while they owned it that otherwise would have been in their pocket or available for investing. Buying and selling price hardly tells the whole story.
Most assume nobody on earth would rent for less than their total costs so you can't lose. In a strong rental market that may be the way...but rental prices are set by supply and demand and market conditions (IE job market) and not what an owners expenses are. An owners loss can be a renters gain.
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