Realistic Long Term Returns

Just an idle thought I have. If I buy a house, it's value should increase by roughly inflation over the long run. Either that or housing will start becoming a disproportionately large portion of the cost of living. If I buy common stock, the growth has the potential to beat inflation because the company can experience real growth and increase the volume of their business. I'm not sure if I expect that to go on for effectively a human life span, but it can certainly go on for a while. If I go for broadly based index funds, will my returns grow at a rate of inflation plus real economy growth? Maybe. Where does the growth of the economy take place? Small industries with firms that have not yet gone public is certainly one. Though with things like the dot com boom and bust, is the trend to form bubbles before returns start or does some growth get missed? Small companies that are not yet part of the index growing into larger firms is another area where things get missed. Large companies that shrinks however are typically included in indexes. Now I've certainly lost sight of where I was going in this ramble, but I was going somewhere wit h it, I think.