Well, the foreclosure and eviction moratorium ended 2 days ago. Tenants haven't paid rent in a year. Ripple effect, hits landlord/owners who are equally behind on mortgages having not received the rental income. Hard to make up 1 year of payments, so we may see millions of defaults near term. Perhaps not. But we also might see owner/landlords now quite gun shy about owning/renting properties so bailing on that business model and dumping houses, which is a downward economic force.
Would YOU gamble and own a house to rent it, given what we just experienced where your renters don't pay for a year? I would not.
And, just like in 2008, people purchased over-priced homes with low interest rates but they cannot afford them. Set aside the folks coming from CA with cash buying outright; I'm talking about the 20 and 30 somethings with no incomes or low incomes who got easy loans and low interest rates on houses way outside their means. Either pre-pandemic or during the pandemic. These people have been living on very generous unemployment and stimulus money, with no commuting expenses, no daycare expenses, no eating out expenses, b/c they've been sitting home for a year. Many have not paid their mortgages. Foreclosures are eminent.
When they have to get a reliable car, pay fuel, pay insurance, eat out or pack lunches, pay for daycare, etc. they won't be able to maintain the standard of living they enjoyed and will be forced to downsize their homes.