I should have known to come here for synchronicity. My wife and I saw some old friends last night, great people, but the real estate bug has caught them badly, and they consistently insist on buying bigger and better houses. In seeing them last night I detected something off, I think they knew they'd gone too far, but still not willing to back down and downsize, it's a sort of quiet terror, but an unwillingess to talk about anything other than endless growth. So yes, I think you may very well be right.

I on the other hand am no paragon of virtue, I am just no good at making money other than providing for my family, so I proved successful at collapsing ahead of time by default :)