> There are people who bought a house for $100k in 1990 where that house is now worth $2M. Are you $1.9M richer? No.

This is often repeated but not 100% correct.

You are in fact richer, and you can leverage this $2m in equity to take on debt and buy more houses. This is what has been happening here in Australia, and it's a major factor in the continued rise in prices.

When you've done this, hung on a handful of years and all of your houses have gone up 20-50%, you can cash out for a very nice sum indeed. AFAICT this is now a pretty mainstream middle-class retirement plan in this country, and it's terrible because, as you point out -

> Increasing house prices are simply stealing from the next generation

The money is coming from people, usually younger people, who are funding the insane market with ever larger mortgages and staying in rental properties longer, both of which benefit the equity-holder.