The fundamental issue with housing as an investment is that it is a monolithic and non-fluid vehicle, which makes it worse when leverage comes into play. Whereas stocks can be purchased/sold at any time in an instant and have fractional costs (sometimes as cheap as 10$ per stock), houses are not, and fast fluctuations in prices could heavily impact your ability to realize your gains. So it is, on that aspect, a terrible investment.
For large companies owning thousands of units, this is not an issue since they are spreading the risks across the units (by buying diversely located units of all types). They can also quickly execute purchases and sales since they are in that exact business.
So the argument that houses are ways to pass down wealth is misguided: they are terrible ways to pass down wealth, and parents should leave a trust fund or safe investments rather than a house if their goal is to build generational wealth - housing should be passed down for personal reasons.