Instead of buying stocks and bonds, which are the conventional approach for someone new to financial planning, real estate has become increasingly the choice of young people as a first investment.

buying stocks and bonds, which are the conventional approach for someone new to financial planning, real estate has become increasingly the choice of young people

buying stocks and bonds, which are the conventional approach for those new to financial planning, increasingly young people have shown a choice for real estate

buying stocks and bonds, which are the conventional approach for someone new to financial planning, the choice of young people increasingly has become real estate

buying stocks and bonds, which are the conventional investments for those new to financial planning, young people have increasingly chosen real estate

stocks and bonds, which are the conventional approach for those new to financial planning, young people have shown an increasing choice of real estate

I have a tangential question here based on the explanation --
The original sentence contains the idiom “Instead of A, [subject] B”, where A contains a verb ending in “-ing”. The correct form of this idiom can be seen in the following simple sentence:

Instead of doing his homework, Arthur watched TV.

Here “doing his homework” is A, “Arthur” is the subject, and “watched TV” is B. The original sentence is, when we take out the modifying “which” clause, as follows:

The original sentence contains the idiom “Instead of A, [subject] B”, where A contains a verb ending in “-ing”. The correct form of this idiom can be seen in the following simple sentence:

Instead of doing his homework, Arthur watched TV.

Here “doing his homework” is A, “Arthur” is the subject, and “watched TV” is B. The original sentence is, when we take out the modifying “which” clause, as follows:



"Instead of," is normally used to compare nouns and "rather than" is used to compare verbs. If I have rewrite the sentence completely, would you suggest "rather than" here? Let me ask this way, how would I modify the Arthur's e.g and the original sentence to use "rather than"?

As you note, you can usually write a sentence to use either "rather than" or "instead of" - just depends on how you structure it. (Just as a general rule, "rather than" has more flexibility in usage than "instead of" - so "rather than" is more often right when you see it on the GMAT. Don't automatically pick it but, if you can't tell, then guess "rather than.")

I also want to clarify something in the explanation - it mentions "a verb ending in -ing" - which is an easy way to state what's going on, but it's not complete. A verb ending in -ing may not actually be functioning as a verb in a sentence - such a structure can function as a verb, noun, adverb, or adjective. Verbs ending in -ing only function as verbs if they directly follow some form of the verb "to be." For example, I am having people over for dinner tonight. "Having" functions as a verb in that sentence. Having friends is a wonderful thing. "Having" now functions as a noun (and the subject!) in that sentence.

In the above example, both "doing" and "buying" are not functioning as verbs - they are nouns, so they meet the criterion to use "instead of."

Or I could say "Rather than buy stocks and bonds, young people increasingly choose real estate."
Or "Rather than do his homework, Arthur watched TV. (Though I find these more clunky - the "instead of" versions are preferable, in my opinion.)

Thanks for your response. Here is another thread that could be useful for other people

http://www.manhattangmat.com/forums/rather-than-accept-the-conventional-wisdom-that-the-earth-t1177.html

Please post the OA

OA is D