text: aiea7 you don't realize you are helping to make my point.  The average homeowner moves every 7 years.  The average car owner owns his car for over 10 years, so the homeowner can pay for his own upgrade when the time comes as you note.  You can do the research yourself on length of ownership.  Also many car owners keep their vehicles for decades and they can also last forever, so your time/longevity argument comparing homes with cars is flawed.
  
  But if you're still not convinced, why don't you support homeowners who have beachfront properties with crumbling seawalls, erosion to their foundations, or rockslides from their upper neighbors, to also have taxpayers pay for their repairs?  Some of them are elderly with fixed incomes too, and some have died from such accidents.  This would also be a public good, a matter of life and death, and would increase public safety, accessibility, and help the environment!  Your arguments fall apart when you have to apply consistency.