Here is some scary stuff on the housing bubble.:

This is starting to look like the makings of the perfect storm. Lending institutions are pushing more and more dangerous loans that aren't secured, which buyers can't pay back. Buyers in turn load up on debt and interest-only loans, hoping the rates don't rise and buying into the market at the top of the bubble. Meanwhile, interest rates rise as our nation's budget and trade deficit put pressure on the dollar. And with rates going up, that cools down the housing sales and refinancing that has fueled much of the economic growth for several years. Housing prices drop, which means more loans are left unsecured with no way to pay them back.

We all need to remember that, regardless of what Dick Cheney said, deficits do matter. They played with our economy like a game of Texas hold-em, and we just came up with an empty hand.

ABC News: Fresh Data Shows Cooling Housing Market:

Sales of previously owned homes plunged in July to the lowest level in 2 1/2 years and the inventory of unsold homes climbed to a new record high, fresh signs that the housing market has lost steam.

The crash of the housing market is like a slow-motion train wreck. You know it's happening, but you try not to believe all the signs around you.

I saw the same thing in 2000 in the stock market. I had the misfortune of taking a dot com job a week before the crash. My new co-workers told me how lucky I was because my stock options came in at $11 a share, while many of them were stuck at $40. The stock had nowhere to go but up, right?

Five months later the cut all our jobs. I later used my options papers to start a fire in my woodstove.