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The difference between the U.S subprime and us is, in the U.S the loan was against the house, here the loan is against the person.

So in the U.S once the house value dropped below the loan value the borrower just handed the house over to the bank, it was called jingle mail the sound of the house keys in the envelope.

In Australia the borrower owns the debt, when the house is sold, the borrower still owes the shortfall, unless it has insurance to cover that eventuality.

So the banks still have exposure here, but nothing like the subprime loans.

That is also why the European banks suffered so much in the GFC, the yanks were bundling up these crap house loans in big packages and onselling them to the EU banks as CDO's, which actually had no underpinning collateral, Australia was fortunate our banks were too small to get involved.