House repossession was rated as the event most likely to cause mental health problems, ahead of redundancy, or finding out about infertility.
Charity Rethink called for action to prevent a "mental health disaster".
The survey was published as a UN report showed England spends more of its health budget on mental health care than any other European country.
Comment: Thirty years of Thatcherist economic policies might have something to do with it.
Rethink's director of public affairs Paul Corry said: "I wouldn't be surprised if we see a rise in the number of people going to their doctor because of mental health problems in the coming months.
"Even for people lucky enough to hang on to their home, the stress and worry of arrears building up can be enough to harm your mental health - this survey shows it worries millions of us."
He said that people who already had mental health problems were likely to be treated less well by their lenders, and did not have a "safety net" to protect them.
He said: "There's an urgent need to do something to prevent a mental health disaster."
Another mental health charity agrees with that assessment - Mind, which is launching its own ยฃ16m initiative to link exercise to better mental health, and to reduce stigma, released its own report earlier this year warning about the dangers of debt.
High ranking
The survey of 2,000 people was released to mark World Mental Health day.
The World Health Organisation report contained a far cheerier message about the services in place to tackle the UK's mental health problems.
It compared spending on mental health in European countries, and found England and Wales spent 13.8% of its health budget on mental health - the highest level in Europe.
Scotland spent 9.8%, according to the report, and in the UK as a whole, the numbers of psychiatrists per 100,000 people was found to be above the European average.
More detained
Health Secretary Alan Johnson said he was "delighted" by the report, citing a huge rise in investment as the reason for the UK's present position, and said that the focus was now on community-based teams to treat patients.
"The pernicious concept of the asylum is over, but our commitment to improving services further is undiminished," he said.
However, a report in this week British Medical Journal suggested that, over the past 10 years, the use of inpatient mental hospitals has increased, rather than lessened.
Dr Patrick Keown, a Newcastle-based psychiatrist, calculated that the number of patients "sectioned" under the Mental Health Act increased by a fifth between 1996 and 2006.
At the same time, the number of psychiatric beds in England fell.
A spokesman for the charity Sane said: "Improvements in community care are supposed to reduce the need for compulsory admission when someone reaches crisis point - yet precisely the opposite appears to have happened.
"We urgently need to find out why this is the case."
BBC. Hmmm. I wonder if the mental health of Iraqis was even the remotest consideration or even topic of discussion when they were/are under threat from the very people who are now whining about their mental health from the current economic meltdown. Observe the contrast. Brits and Americans are now under mental duress from the threat of repossession of their homes (by the same war profiteering bankers who rallied for war). That same society put Iraqis under the mental & physical stress of witnessing with their own eyes, repossession of the lives of their loved ones โ together with all their possessions โ not to mention homes โ by England and the USโs terrorist bombs. Who considered the mental health of Iraqis who watched the physical meltdown of their children, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, grands & friends โ all without even the benefit of hospitals or even an Excedrin? Their economic meltdown was complete - 100%. A dangerous flat in Bagdad today costs more than its equivalent in London. Add to all the violence - economic & physical - unleashed by England & the US, is the humiliation of Americans and Brits kicking in your door, shooting the dogs & cats, man-handling & traumatizing all, including women, children the aged and infirm; tearing up the furniture and belongings; pocketing any money or jewelry in the house & taking away every able-bodied man or boy with these hideous bags over their heads. Add yet still the addition of the enormous amount of disease (biological warfare) inflicted by the Western mob by bombing water treatment plants, electricity plants, hospitals: death by the hepatitis, cholera, dysentary and many other infectious and dangerous diseases โ courtesy of the wonderful West. So if the ONLY thing that the West gets as a consequence is economic meltdown, its a small price to pay for the luxury of waging wars, invasions & crippling sanctions of choice. The very least they deserve for all their crimes against humanity is mental duress and a little inconvenience.