Why are governments so reluctant to react to these housing bubbles? Because voters that own homes feel really fantastic about themselves seeing these high prices on their appraisals - it makes them feel like millionaires. Happy voters tend to vote status quo.

Of course, only a few of these owners are smart enough to cash in at these historic prices and crystallize their gains (and actually become millionaires). The majority will just sit there and watch the housing bubble eventually deflate, just like they watched it inflate. It is all built on historically cheap money (more so than foreign buyers, which are a catalyst, but that's it) - and the writing is on the wall for the end of cheap money.