Mr. Frank McDonald:

In a property bubble situation, everyone thinks it will continue going up in spectacular leaps from year to year. Some years there was a 20% increase in property values, etc. Naturally, for anyone trying to get on to the ladder, as it became known, that would have induced almost a sense of panic. First-time buyers were panicked into buying at ridiculously inflated asset values like €450,000 for a two-bedroom flat for example. One of the problems we have in this country - it was certainly the case during the boom - is that we accept far too many things as normal that are not normal.