Attention mortgage brokers, realtors and other real estate industrial complex workers: Start Looking.

Some have estimated over 1 Million real estate linked jobs will be lost due to the housing bubble bursting. Heck, I think Phoenix itself could lose 1 Million jobs, once you add in all the Best Buy salesmen, Home Depot workers, etc that will also be layed off in the downturn now that the Housing ATM is out of service, and new houses are no longer needed.

For mortgage bankers and realtors, they'll need to learn to go from "would you like interest only" to "would you like fries with that?"

Slowing home market to ripple through job market
USA TODAY

With the allure of easy money, thousands of Americans flocked to jobs in the real estate industry during the boom years.

You saw it — there were dollar signs in their eyes," recalls Nick Vayonis, a former real estate agent in Los Angeles, where median home prices rose 145% in four years

That's because housing helped drive the economy out of the last recession. Almost four out of every 10 jobs created in the past four years were in housing-related fields. At the end of last year, a record 9.8% of U.S. workers were employed in the real estate industry, up from 8.2% a decade ago, according to Moody's Economy.com. Only the health care industry added more jobs.

Last month, Washington Mutual said it would close 10 mortgage processing centers and fire 2,500 employees. In November, mortgage company Ameriquest handed out 1,500 pink slips. The housing industry is braced for more belt-tightening.

"At best, people should prepare for no pay increase and no bonus, something they have been getting a lot of. At worst, they should be thinking they may need to change occupations," says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com in West Chester, Pa.