I’d be willing to guess that the number of people who are in trouble outnumbers those who have made cash by selling at the peak. One reason would be those that bought a new home. The developers/contractors would seem to be the ones who make out those instances. But they make out at the expense of many times more people and families.

Another reason is that a percentage of those who sold their homes at the peak likely bought another home at the peak, rather than investing their cash and renting. In these instances the extra cash made in the sale went as a down payment on a new loan (exotic perhaps?) on another over-priced property. Wouldn’t purchasing an over-priced property essentially offset most, if not all, gains made from selling an over-priced property?