A lot of speculators were indeed left 'holding the bag', as it were, when the credit game collapsed and there were no more greater fools to sell to. But the rea

A lot of speculators were indeed left 'holding the bag', as it were, when the credit game collapsed and there were no more greater fools to sell to. But the reason there were no more such fools is that the lenders had scraped the bottom of the barrel, and there was no one left to lend to. There's no question that credit standards were loosened across the board, and it was possible for almost anyone to get a loan. For a while, foreclosure rates were low as long as it was possible to refi or sell your way out of a problem. Another thing that happened was a lot of people borrowed against rising equity and spent the money as if it were free cash, and found out the hard way later that it wasn't. And that's before we even get into the effects of fraud--underwriting fraud, appraisal fraud, fraudulent bond ratings, forged paper trails, and on and on. The bubble floated on an ocean of fraud. It was an unrestrained orgy of greed and criminality on every level.