The case-shiller charts support your contention that the plankton theory did not hold during the early 90’s bubble. The thirds move pretty much together.
In the current bubble, the thirds diverged considerably. Bottom third rose much faster, and is now falling much faster, with a slight tendency to fall earlier than the upper third. I would not be surprised to see the bottom third line actually cross the top third line on its way down. At the peak, the bottom third was 70 points higher than the top third; they are now only 20 points apart.
Bottom third still has to drop by 48% nominal to get back to 1997 nadir (in real terms) in 2012. There are a lot of plankton yet to die off.
