What Housing Crisis?

Even as the U.S. housing market plummets and millions face foreclosure, the mega-rich continue to build lavish mansions. In Los Angeles's "platinum triangle" of Beverly Hills, Bel-Air, and Holmby Hills, at least 20 homes larger than 20,000 square feet are slated to begin construction in 2008, according to the Los Angeles Times.

One local realtor told the Times that the mega-rich "keep adding the rooms [they] think [they] need. The ballrooms. The screening room. Masters with his and hers and a beauty salon and a massage room. And the house keeps growing. ... a gift-wrapping room ... a florist room." For the director of an area nature conservancy, the trend is all about ego: people design these homes "so everyone will know—aha—there is the richest person on the hill."

While the rich may be unaffected by mounting economic woes, analysts predict that the nation's real estate markets won't boom again until at least sometime after 2020. If these mega-mansions are the product of an economic downturn, imagine (if you dare) those that would be built during a boom!