It is interesting how many people are misinformed about this. The government hasn't and can't do anything to "prop up" house prices. It only sets the prime interest rate, which affects the ability of people to borrow money (specifically does it affect ARM mortgages), essentially the ability of people to "afford" housing, or the rate at which they'll be able to convert the debt behind their mortgage into equity.

Here is an interesting fact: My house whenever I can afford it, will _not_ be the most expensive thing I will have to buy in my life. My retirement savings are.

Again, not true. As you get older, as you're converting larger and larger portions of that debt behind your mortgage into equity, it should be close to being paid off by the time you reach retirement (the theoretical pie in the sky for our generation). So the amount of "retirement savings" one needs depends on what kind of housing situation one is in at the beginning of retirement. The sub-prime lending crisis occurred because people who HAD worked their whole lives, had accumulated their retirement savings in their houses or whatnot were literally swindled out of that savings by real estate people selling them "refinance" lemon loans and banking on the commissions.