I don't know much about the living costs, etc in Finland.
In most areas in North America, if the mortgage and rent costs are equal, you are still better off renting purely based on the typical operational costs of having a home.
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After 25 years, does this still hold?
I see a house as a kind of store of value - rarely will it make a profit, although I have made a profit on the last two apartments I have owned and renovated (all other costs considered). This allowed me to move from one to another and then build the deposit for the house, plus some extra for renovation costs.
Typically, unless you get lucky and buy a home in a speculative market and are able to sell when it is high, vs low.
Over the entire province I live in, the average is a 4% increase in value a year, but that is heavily driven by the urban area. If you assume that rent will increase about the same AND take any operational expenses from owning and put in the market, which has a typical return over any 10yr period excess of 5%, you come out cash ahead renting over 25 yrs.
I haven't done the detailed calculations recently (in the last 6yrs / since I bought) but I did often as my father pressured me to buy because I was "wasting money renting". The truth is that the flexibilty of renting PLUS the extra cash from not having the operational costs, allowed me to move across the world chasing amazing opportunities (both monetary and experience) in my 20s allowing me to have the cash in the bank to buy a home when we were ready to settle.
We ONLY bought because we wanted a place to mould to our wants. Something that we could move walls, add to the property, etc. My partner is an architect and I have lots of construction experience from jobs growing up.
Buying home is less of a financial decision and more of a lifestyle decision.
Unless you put cash into it, it is likely a depreciating asset, an asset that is relatively illiquid compared to stocks, bonds, cash, bitcoin, etc. with its own set of market pressures that are typically out of your control.
This is as it should be.
When it comes to having the extra cash, I am not sure that on average, it would be extra at all, meaning that the majority of people will expand their lifestyle and consume it, not invest it to generate income now or in the future. If we look at the lifestyle of a student who can live off little and still get drunk, that habit doesn't seem to change as the same student earns in a career - they still get drunk on the excess, though it might not be cheap beer and condoms :)
Oh yeah, and don't forget about all that sweat equity that you do yourself, that has an opportunity cost compared to what you could earn with that time.
If you do the renos for love and "hobby" that cost is reduced, but it is still there.
If you are someone that wants to just "hang" in their spare time, and you have to pay someone to do all the "work" rarely will buying make sense.
Like the extra, it is the same thing. Having time, doesn't mean that the time will be well spent. People can game a full-time job of hours a week, but complain they don't have enough money to invest. If they spent half that time working at a fast-food joint, they would be far better off - but who wants to take a second job at a fast-food joint?
I think that a person has to consider their own willingness and likelihood of behavior, when looking at the op cost of time spent. It is the same thing with - if I had bought 1 dollar bitcoin I would be worth hundreds of millions now.... but how many would have held? Most would have happily sold at 3 dollars and feel pretty good - at the time.