They are probably in total shock and are covering their feelings with rationalizations. I think that many people just didn’t believe prices would really come down like they have…I didn’t. I think some of you know that I bought in Feb 2007 when we moved here from Seattle and just didn’t have the market understanding like we do now to have made the decision not to buy (yes, that makes me an FB) Prices were (still are) very high in Seattle so when we moved here we didn’t have sticker shock and just accepted the high prices. At the time we didn’t realize that there were so many “crazy” loans out there and just believed either people made a high salary or had rolled previous equity to the new home to afford the high prices. When I talk to other people about our house lossing over 100K in value they usually just have the attitude that prices will return within a few years (no more than 5), I wonder if your friends also believe that or are just using that rationalization to soothe their anger. I think it will be a very, very long time before they see 600,000 again for their home.