If by "own" you mean "make a mortgage payment to a bank/credit union," then count me in. We own a condo near the beach (<1 mile) and bought at THE ABSOLUTE WRONG TIME. We paid a lot of f-ing money, got caught up in a terrible neg-am loan, but were lucky enough by the grace of God (or insert your higher being here) that both my wife and I had been gradually receiving raises at our respective jobs and were able to refinance into a normal loan before our place repriced and we became über-screwed.
Our place is a 2-bed/1.5 bath nestled in a modest 1100 sq. ft. dwelling. No garage (we do have a carport, though), no yard. All this could have been yours for $500,000 in 2005. Fortunately for you, we took it off the market!
All said and done, despite the nightmare and upside-down-ness we were in with this place, we still have a roof over our head and are paying toward principal now on a home in a place where values go down, but always come back up. We are just going to have to wait a little longer than we originally anticipated to move into something larger. I've got two boys -- rowdy ones -- and our place can't hold us all much longer. I try to look at the big picture, though, in that we are a lot better off than many who bought when and where we did.
Benefits to owning are numerous; however, in a condo situation you are not granted some of the freedoms you mentioned. We can modify the inside of the house as we see fit, but anything done to the outside of the unit has to be approved by the HOA.
Oh and doesn't the smell of the ferret tip off your landlord that you're keeping pets? A buddy of mine owned a ferret for a long time, and that animal definitely brings with it a unique -- shall we say -- "scent."