Would like to point out my understanding, dun think your networth diminish just because you took on a housing loan.

Just like you take on a personal loan, you get the money up front, you get a liability up front too, on balance sheet, the asset and liability match (almost matching, ignoring transactions fees or up front interest).

So buying a house, you owned the house (asset), you mortgage your house, you get cash, you get liability. If you take new housing loan to financing for new purchase, your net worth drops when your house value drop by a lot, while your liability still have outstanding to pay. Usually, net worth increase when the prop appreciate more than the housing loan outstanding, that's how people build their net worth with Real Estate.

of course unless u took housing loan to renovate the house, that does not reflect in adding value to the market value of the house itself. Meant for a joke, e.g. put a fish pond in your living room.

Cheers.