Is It Better to Buy or Rent?

I have been thinking about buying a house. Since the interest rate is still low and it seems to be a good investment idea. Also I am paying rent anyways, why not have part of that go into the equity, right? But then I was thinking that there are other expenses for homeowners, for example the property tax, the upkeep fee, home improvement fee, and stuff like that. There is also the housing price change rate, and the rental price change. Opportunity cost. Now or later. It’s getting to be like a giant formula now.

Then I came across this nice visual tool. I guess someone thought about all these and decided to make a tool for it. You can play around the numbers and see whichever scenario you are in makes more sense to do what.

Here is the link: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/business/buy-rent-calculator.html

P.S. You will need to know a little bit of the housing terminologies. Look them up at google! ;)