Around here, many renters are pretty well-off. It's really difficult to own a home in the city.
Brooklyn, for example, has seen an explosion of high-rent apartment buildings, occupied by nerds like us.
If you are lucky enough to own a home/apartment in the city, you are either crazy rich, or, more likely, brought the home before it exploded in value, making you "paper rich."
Many of the apartment-dwellers in the city make a lot more than homeowners.
All that to say you agree with the GP: homeowners, as a class, are wealthier than renters. How owner occupiers choose to spend their wealth has nothing to do with the fact they have it.
Well, "paper rich" is dicey. It means that you may have the burdens of money, but few of the advantages (like actually being able to spend it).
Farmers, for example, are often multimillionaires "on paper," but don't have a pot to piss in.
They could choose a different lifestyle, but they value the one they have. That's fine, but that doesn't mean I'm obligated to subsidize their preferences.
Owner-occupiers can and do refinance to turn their wealth into cash. It's routine.
> they value the one they have
So do you. I assume that you like to eat? Farmers are how that happens.
> refinance
Are you familiar with the downsides of refinancing?
They can sell at their convenience and have their wealth liquid. Then they are in the exact same situation as renters, except that they have a big pile of money to boot.
Same thing for farmers.