The Great Eviction

[Warpy]

2. If the neighborhood was a "good" one

with the houses built with every latest fad installed, Wall Street is buying up the empties, presumably to rent to their former owners if they can afford it.

In "bad" neighborhoods (the ones where the predominant skin color was a shade of brown instead of fish belly white), the housing will be allowed to deteriorate as it first gets squatted in, then vandalized, then torched. Taking those houses off the market will reduce overall housing stock and drive rents up. Most of those neighborhoods are already at the vandalism stage. Arson isn't far behind.

Once all the CDOs went up in smoke and the bailout shored up Wall Street, the looting phase was on. Welcome to the new ownership society, the one in which the bottom 99% will seldom be able to own much of anything.