There is a lot of confusion and question regarding assets and liabilities. And I also had similar confusion regarding assets and liabilities. 

Many of us commit great mistakes by spending our money on liabilities and that's how we fall into the trap of spending all our income throughout our lifetime. 

Now I will try to take some example to explain what is an asset and what is a liability.

Car

Now is buying a car be counted as spending money on an asset?  Actually a car requires a constant expenditure to be spent on it every time you use it. It needs a petrol or diesel charge always you use it. So you got to spend money on it for each time use, even after buying the car which amounts to several lakhs. Then you have to do servicing of the car every time you require it and you have to constantly pay some money on maintaining a car. So your money is constantly spent even after buying the car with such a lot of money. So if it was an asset you could have gained money from it. Now if you buy a car and give it on rent for some money , then you can actually earn the money required for its maintenance. So in that case your car is not so much of a liability. So how you are using your car decide if its an asset or liability only. 

House

Similarly a house also requires constant repairment and maintenance which requires a lot of money even after construction cost or buying cost. So you constantly spend money on your house without gaining money. On the other hand if you buy a house for yourself and use one story for your personal use and give rent on the other floors. Then you can actually earn the money for the maintenance of the house. 

If you buy a flat and give it for rent, then also you are earning some money each month from your flat. Although you have spent money on buying the flat but you can actually earn from it thereafter.

So the way you use your house or flat decides if its an asset or liability. 

Many of us just say that a house or car cannot be termed as an asset but in todays world we can use our possessions in different ways. So the way we use them decides if we are going to gain from them or just waste all our money on them.