Cure the disease, don't treat the symptom

[Seddrinth]

Houses don't need to be a limited resource to make getting them feel rewarding. Even if we had a fully fledged instanced housing system just making the price high enough, or meeting other prerequisites to purchase the house (such as a rep grind or a long series of quests) would make finally getting a house feel like an accomplishment.

Many things in this game feel rewarding to get without being a limited resource.

This is actually a good idea. They can have sections of housing locked and you have to accomplish certain things in game to unlock these sections. For example, if you clear a savage tier, you unlock a section, If you clear one ultimate, you unlock another section, etc. If you level up all crafting, you unlock a section with crafting themed housing. If you get certain ranks in pvp, you get another pvp themed section of housing that you can buy a house from, etc.