Renting also wins when your income or location is genuinely uncertain, since a mortgage locks you into a fixed monthly obligation and a specific property in a way a lease does not, and job mobility matters more to some buyers than building equity does.
Buying tends to win once you plan to stay five years or more, because a fixed mortgage payment holds while rent typically rises over that period, and part of every mortgage payment builds equity rather than disappearing entirely into a landlord's return.
At the Saskatoon benchmark of $444,700 with 1.63 months of supply, the calculation is closer than in a hotter market, so it genuinely depends on your specific timeline. Get your hand-reviewed valuation from Joel Dyck.