Our first PPOR was a little 2-bedder clad home in Wentworthville in Western Sydney - 700sqm block, quiet street - absolutely loved that little house, it was tiny but as it was just the two of us it was perfectly fine and very much felt like home from the first time we saw it. We bought it in 1996 for $146k, I had to sell my car to make up some of the deposit.
Sold it in 2000 for $240k, we thought we'd won the lotto!
(Of course now it's worth about $450-500k ... I kinda think we should have held onto it, but it didn't cross our minds and besides finances wouldn't have allowed it at the time.)
We upgraded to a better suburb for $280k, 3-bed/2-bath brick home with pool, old but we renovated a bit, added a nice big covered deck. We sold after 3 years for $485k - yipeeeeeee! It was the absolute height of the market. We had bought a block of land 12months earlier so we went on to build our dream home nearby.
Market hasn't done a huge amount since then, but overall we've gone from a $146k home to a nearly paid-off $650k+ home in about 13 years - and around $350k of that has come from capital growth - so gotta be pretty happy with that!
In hindsight I wouldn't change a thing - I believe PPOR is a vastly different proposition to IP, you have to be happy in your home, area, proximity to family, friends, school and work, it's almost completely touchy-feely, while IP should be a pure numbers game.
First kiss - definitely would have chosen someone different!