Although the Great Financial Crash hit like an avalanche in 2007, the first tremors could be felt more than two years earlier. It was the summer of 2005, and although most economists were predicting “sunny and fair skies” as far as the eye could see, an astute investor could have glimpsed the first signs of trouble. Although U.S. real estate appeared to be booming, the shares of a few publicly traded homebuilders, including Beazer, D.R. Horton, Pulte and Lennar, started to crack. Over the next three years, a series of wrenching declines would reduce their value by more than 80%.
