But there have been long (decade+) stretches when I actively did not want to own. I was single, or I knew my family size would change and didn't want to buy a huge house, or I knew I would only be in the market for a few years.
The transaction costs of buying and selling each time would have been probably 5-10% of the total price of the house (broker fee, mortgage fees, inspections, etc). It simply would not have made sense to buy and sell a house every time I moved.
Having plenty of rentals available made it easy to move to where I needed to be, in a house size that made sense (neither too big nor small), in a cost-effective way.
The answer of "don't move so much" cuts income mobility. I moved to the SF Bay Area because it offered higher salaries. And it wouldn't solve the issue of family size changing.
(I haven't yet done the reverse -- which is to rent out the house I now own, but if I get a job offer somewhere else it'd be silly to force a sale to make it impossible for me to come back.)