Look no further than Kern's own Rosamond for what happened the last time this occurred in the early '90s. Houses went unfinished, or empty, for years. Vandals eventually trashed them, and banks wrote off the losses. The real question is if the feds are going to step in to prevent the subprime "meltdown" (and in the process artificially support higher housing prices), or if they're going to stay out and "allow" the economy to take the hit and stall out (if not start a recession) for the next few years. Will this become a political point for the upcoming presidential election? Things are very uncertain right now, and with as unstable as they potentially are, I wouldn't be betting on anything.