Demand for good, affordable, and well-designed housing hasn’t crashed. Demand for horribly inflated, built-for-bullet-points spec’d, balloon-framed McMansions has crashed.

Sort of like how “no one wants to work anymore (For $11.50/hr)!!!” Slash the prices on the houses to pre-pandemic levels and I bet they’d sell.

1. 5% isn’t a plummet.
2. Demand has not diminished; people have just given up on being able to afford homes.