CHICAGO — The nation's long housing boom will end not with a bang, but in a prolonged period of whimpering as homeowners suffer through stagnant pricing that could last years.

That was the consensus of economists gathered in Chicago as they viewed the likelihood that a so-called housing bubble will end in a crash.

Their conclusion: It won't.

But homeowners will no longer be able to use houses as piggy banks, cashing in on gains in appreciation periodically through low-cost refinancings. And many will be forced to hold onto a house or condominium for a long time as they wait for prices to rise.

The problem is that rising mortgage rates are putting an end to the easy money that underpinned increasing home prices, said Richard Brown, chief economist of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in Washington.

"Price increases have far outstripped income growth for a long time, particularly in the last two years, but that period is coming to an end," he said.

The so-called golden age for mortgage lending is about over after lasting about 20 years, he said.

"The end of the boom probably is not far away," Brown said. "It likely will lead to a long period of price stagnation but not technically a bust."

House prices have been artificially boosted recently by the lowest mortgage rates in three decades, and high-risk lending has fed the fires of home price inflation, according to Brown. Such lending involves interest-only mortgages or those that allow the buyer to set his own monthly payments, without paying off principal.

Home prices "have been rising far more rapidly than rents for the last four years. This probably is what Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan meant when he pointed to froth in the housing market," said economist Richard Rosen of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

The economists were brought together Wednesday by professor George Kaufman of Loyola University Chicago's Department of Finance to answer the question, "Is there a housing bubble?" More than 220 people attended.