This paper makes contributions to long-established debates about the meaning of home-ownership and to the growing interest in discourse and language in urban and housing research. It outlines a theoretical framework in which analogy and metaphor are crucial devices in the social construction of home-ownership knowledge. The paper draws upon some results from qualitative fieldwork undertaken amongst a small group of home-owner households in Bristol, UK, to illustrate metaphorically structured, common-sense aphorisms as rhetorical techniques in the mobilisation of tenure prejudice. The paper concludes by outlining new directions for research exploring the cultural significance of housing tenure, and makes some more general observations regarding the significance of analogy and metaphor in urban studies. (Craig Gurney)