Nobody is better than Sowell at distilling complex economic acts and concepts into a readable and compelling package. Housing Boom and Bust is just exhibit M to this fact.

If you need a solid understanding of what got us into the current housing mess then this is the book to read. Unfortunately the government role in causing it all is probably now being repeated in the entire bail outs fiasco. However, returning to the real estate front, what is of greater concern to me is the 1000lb gorilla in the room that no one is talking about that is going to crash real estate AGAIN for valid economic reasons (as opposed to governmental screw ups) just a few years from now. I am talking about the looming massive and UNAVOIDABLE crashing demographic tidal wave described by Arnold in The Great Bust Ahead (you can read about on the book's amazon listing and also on [...]) that will create the greatest depression in our history and therefore a monster real estate crash.

Thomas Sowell presents lots of information on current crisis and explores government intervention into this and past crisis's. Worth reading if you are interested in macro-economics explained in terms even I can understand!!