Simply put there will NOT be any housing market collapse or crash and I can say this due to a little thing called mathematics and facts.
Each time this false argument of a market collapse speaks of layoffs and loss of income on a universal scale, nothing could be farther from the truth. I had a prospective tenant call in yesterday looking for our very highest end house to rent, and wanted to know if she could pay 1 year in advance, she owns a business in the medical industry.
Pleanty of thought and talk has gone to all the workers on layoff, how about some talk about those who are in a giant boom right now? Darn near anyone in any form of the medical industry, not just Doctors and nurses but how about medical supply companies, CNC machining for medical devices and on and on and on, they are all working as much as possible and holding hiring campaigns. Age centers (sorry, I don't know the PC term for old folks home today) are hiring left right and center.
I live in MN, at the height of our lockdown the numbers showed "as much as" 30% of workers were negatively affected in their working situation, be it working from home too laid off, that leaves 70% working as normal OR working and earning MORE. For those not good with numbers we call that a majority.
So with just these above simple facts that don't even take into account the added stimulus payments to UI receiving persons affecting a 100%+ payment of regular pre UI income, it is simply not mathematical to have a "collapse" of any kind what so ever.
Now speaking to the housing industry; it drives me absolutely koo-koo-crazy when people speak of housing in a selectable term like a hamburger or blue jeans, HOUSING IS NOT OPTIONAL. There are 3 foundational need requirements of life; food, water and SHELTER aka housing. So, in order for there to be even a possibility for a housing collapse there would require to be a surplus potential of housing, that's ingredient #1, do we have this, no, we are in a housing shortage nationally speaking. So that is barrier to housing collapse number 2.
"But but but" you say, ok, lets find data to prove the laws of supply and demand in housing today, ok.
In MN market right now we have a decrease in housing supply of about 40% since covid-19, interesting fun fact 40% of Minnesotans haven't died or stopped needing housing since start of covid-19. Have some buyers retracted, you bet some have, but to say all buyers or even most buyers have retreated or won't purchase in general is to also state there original intent to purchase housing was purely selective and not need-driven, which again math says is statistically impossible. So what we are seeing in MN is a housing market value INCREASE effect coming into play (not exactly a key ingredient for market collapse) and it is being driven by supply and demand, fall in supply is outpacing fall in demand, ie increase in marketable value.
Until we find a magic genie and shazam more housing units than marketable demand (which was a key ingredient to previous housing collapse) or have a mass death event on level of statistically significant numbers such as 10%+ of Populus (for those playing at home that's roughly 35million Americans) the laws and numbers of supply and demand present an impossibility for a housing market collapse, proof number 3.
That said, a market shift, well of course but that was happening pre-covid-19 and it just appears that most don't bother to have read about the shift to a predominantly renter based society underway, on pace to flip the numbers to 60/40 renters over homeowners vs the reversed historic average (yeah, thought I was just a pretty face huh). So, yes, this may accelerate market shift, especially as a very high density of those adversely affected by covid-19 are in lowest economic strata and those positively affected are in the higher strata (historic renters vs historic homeowners) and the market effect at play is compression, not collapse, yup market shift without doubt.
And know what, yes things will be a bit different, like when the housing collapse changed mortgage finance it did not end the industry, it changed it, the internet changed retail, YoMTV changed.... ok thats a bad example, point is adaptation will be required, some evolution of how business is done and there will always be those few who simply can not or will not adapt and evolve and with such go the way of the dinosaur, but for vast majority, life will go on, we will go on, housing will go on.
