Buy or rent?

I'm considering a cross country move from the south west to east midlands. I'm a little apprehensive as this'll be my first time living alone so was considering renting initially as that'd give me the opportunity to sus things out a little and also allow me to get up and leave if I don't enjoy the area.

On the other hand it feels like a bit of a waste to be renting when I could buy a house instead, not having to give £1000+ a month to a landlord does make this option more palatable. There are a good number of houses in the area that are well within reach, the only issue with this is that if I decided to leave I would have used up my first time buyer status for nothing.

Is it worth buying something and building equity in it just to potentially leave or would it be so much of a hassle that I should rent at first?