US home prices would fall at least 20% and housing starts and demand at least 50% in the worst housing recession since the Great Depression.

Judge over the US housing downturn that began in 2006, through its trough (by the end of 2012). The prediction has four parts: (a) national home prices fell at least 20% peak-to-trough, per the S&P/Case-Shiller national or 20-city index (or the FHFA index); (b) housing starts fell at least 50% from peak, per Census data; (c) housing demand (new and/or existing home sales) fell at least 50% from peak; (d) the downturn was the worst US housing recession since the Great Depression, measured by price declines and activity in the historical record. TRUE: all four hold. MOSTLY TRUE: (a), (b) and (d) hold, and (c) holds for one sales measure but not quite for the other (a fall of 45–50%). MIXED: about half of the parts hold. MOSTLY FALSE: only one part holds, or every decline fell clearly short of its threshold although a severe downturn did occur. FALSE: prices fell less than 10% and starts and sales fell less than 25%.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 S&P CORELOGIC CASE-SHILLER INDEX SHOWS ANNUAL HOME PRICE GAINS INCREASED TO 19.8% IN FEBRUARY S&P Dow Jones Indices (PRNewswire) · 26 April 2022

   “| Index | Level | Date | Level | Date | From Peak (%) | Level | From Trough (%) | From Peak (%) | | National | 184.61 | Jul-06 | 133.99 | Feb-12 | -27.4% | 286.68 | 114.0% | 55.3% |”

2. E2 Transcript of IMF Seminar -- The Risk of a U.S. Hard Landing and Implications for the Global Economy and Financial Markets IMF (IMF News) · 19 September 2007 Own record

   “Roubini: "at least a 15 to 20 percent decline"”

3. E3 Transcript of IMF Seminar -- The Risk of a U.S. Hard Landing and Implications for the Global Economy and Financial Markets IMF (IMF News) · 19 September 2007 Own record

   “Housing starts have fallen by a little more than 30 percent (typical U.S. recession peak-to-bottom fall is 50 percent).”

4. E4 U.S. Housing Market Crash History (1929–2024) | Housing Almanac Housing Almanac · 2 May 2026

   “The 2006–2012 housing crash is the defining event in modern U.S. real-estate history — the only cycle since the Great Depression to produce a sustained, nationwide, multi-year decline in nominal home prices.”

5. E5 Economic & Strategic Research, Economic Commentary - November 2012 Fannie Mae (Economics and Strategic Research) · November 2012

   “Measured in terms of the S&P/Case-Shiller National Home Price Index, we estimate that the peak-to-trough decline in home prices was 34.7 percent between the second quarter of 2006 and the first quarter of 2012.”

6. E6 Economic & Strategic Research, Economic Commentary - November 2012 Fannie Mae (Economics and Strategic Research) · November 2012

   “We expect housing starts to increase 25 percent this year following by slightly more moderate growth in 2013.”

7. E7 Economic & Strategic Research, Economic Commentary - November 2012 Fannie Mae (Economics and Strategic Research) · November 2012

   “Following an expected increase of 10 percent this year from depressed levels, total home sales should rise an additional 6 percent in 2013.”

Part (a) holds: the S&P/Case-Shiller National index fell 27.4% from its July 2006 peak to its February 2012 trough (E1), and Fannie Mae estimated a 34.7% peak-to-trough decline (E5). Part (d) gets some support from a secondary history source calling 2006–2012 the only post-Depression cycle with a sustained nationwide price decline (E4). No Census data in the evidence gives the peak-to-trough fall in housing starts. E3 records only a roughly 30% fall by September 2007, before the trough, and E6 and E7 describe growth in 2012 without giving the size of the earlier fall. Without figures for parts (b) and (c), the verdict could be anywhere from mixed to true, so it is unresolvable.