That's not how that worked - real estate data was always fairly public and if you had enough money it was straightforward to hoover it up - the change in approa

That's not how that worked - real estate data was always fairly public and if you had enough money it was straightforward to hoover it up - the change in approach was more about the last housing crisis and then ZIRP buoying huge tech and real estate interests to drive into home buying in the first place. We had people who were underwater for years combined with a new market that cant afford the extremely high fixed costs and end up eventually paying rents higher than the mortgage in many principalities. If you have a ton of capital it makes perfect sense to park it in a place where you have a guaranteed return.