"the biggest impact on defaults/foreclosures was house price growth (or lack of it) and not unemployment or interest rates."
yep - home owners extracting the equity from their bubble priced houses and spending up on cars, mod-cons and general junk. Doesn't have to be much of a decline in prop. prices for them to be squeezed right out.
They just fell for the "property always goes up" trick - believed that they had bought a golden goose for 5% down.
