I think anyone who was paying attention knew the southern Cal housing market was unsustainable in the long run, but that doesn't make it any easier to watch it crash and burn:

Monday, Dec. 22, 2008 | Nearly 30 percent of homes in San Diego County with a mortgage are worth less than their owners owe on their mortgage, according to new data.

The 29.4 percent share of county homes "underwater" or "upside-down" compares to 27.4 percent for the state and 18.3 percent for the nation. The San Diego County data was prepared for voiceofsandiego.org by First American CoreLogic, and was the only county-level data of its kind released for the quarter ending Sept. 30.

[...] "The people who did the right thing, bought within their means, 30-year-fixed, saved up a down payment -- good for them," Goldman said. "They're still underwater."

[...] "If you sell right now you're by definition either distressed or stupid," London said. Fred Eckert, title rep at Chicago Title, tried to find the silver lining for the underwater statistic: "On the plus side -- 70 percent are still OK," he said.