“I do not understand the people are surprised by this.”
We live with many millions of financially ignorant people. They scream at everything and are powerless because they have no clue how to deal with an obvious economic cycle even though it repeats itself. They are short-sighted in planning, undisciplined economically and uneducated about finance. It’s an educational failure by design that encourages government dependence.
Yes, this cycle lasted about three years longer than it should have. I still blame the effect of Obamacare. It made the recovery from the Great Recession too anemic. So, they had to keep interest rates too cheap for too long. Then when consumer confidence kicked in after Trump was elected we had ten years of pent up demand for real estate. Everyone pig piled in all in the last five years.