This consultant may want to download the Spanish Playbook Website on her laptop from her home office before leaving for the airport, and surf the site during her flight to Madrid.

She would like to move closer to her new job as a financial consultant, cutting the daily commute from an hour each way to something less onerous. But she cannot sell her home.

Mortgage debt was modest relative to home values, and prices were not notably bloated: they fell by 24% between 1929 and 1933, says Edward Pinto, a consultant, so were roughly flat in real terms.