Earnings Labs

Hovnanian Enterprises, Inc. (HOV)

Q1 2009 Earnings Call· Wed, Mar 11, 2009

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Thank you for joining us today for the Hovnanian Enterprises fiscal 2009 first quarter earnings conference call. By now you should have all received a copy of the earnings press release however, if anyone is missing a copy and would like one please contact Donna Roberts at 732-383-2200. We will send you a copy of the release and ensure that you are on the company’s distribution list. There will be a replay of today’s call. This telephone replay will be available after the completion of the call and run for one week. The replay can be accessed by dialing 888-286-8010, pass code 90702453. Again, the replay number is 888-286-8010, pass code 90702453. An archive of the webcast slides will be available for 12 months. This conference is being recorded for rebroadcast and all participants are currently in a listen only mode. Management will make some opening remarks about the first quarter results and then open up the lines for questions. The company will also be webcasting a slide presentation along with the opening comments from management. The slides are available on the investors’ page of the company’s website at www.KHov.com. Those listeners who would like to follow along should log on to the website at this time. Before we begin I would like to remind everyone that the cautionary language about forward-looking statements contained in the press release also applies to any comments made during this conference call and the information in the slide presentation. I would now like to turn over the conference call to Ara Hovnanian, President and Chief Executive Officer of Hovnanian Enterprises.

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

Thank you for participating in today’s call to review the results of our first quarter ended January 31 ’09. Joining me today from the company are Larry Sorsby, Executive Vice President and CFO; Paul Buchanan, Senior Vice President and Chief Accounting Officer; Brad O’Conner, Vice President and Corporate Controller; David Valiaveedan, Vice President Finance; and Jeff O’Keefe, Director of Investor Relations. If you turn to Slide Three you’ll see a brief summary of our first quarter results. We gave all this data and more in our press release which we issued yesterday. There are a few points on the Slide worth a little further discussion. First, in the third line down if you look at net contracts per community during the first quarter it shows the first year-over-year increase in years. While hardly a cause for celebration it is a shift in the right direction. Second, you can see that our cancellation rate decreased during the first quarter of ’09 to 31%. This is solidly below the 38% for last year’s first quarter and well below the high water mark of 42% that we recorded in the fourth quarter of ’08. Third, deliveries in the first quarter of ’08 included about 1,345 homes delivered from our Fort Myers/Cape Coral operation because at that time we determined that we no longer had any further continuing involvement from these homes with construction perm mortgages. Excluding these deliveries our total revenues in the first quarter of ’09 were down 53% and deliveries were down approximately 47% compared to a 66% decline for both deliveries and revenues with the ’08 Fort Myers included. Fourth, we purchased $53.2 million of face value of debt for $14.7 million in cash and we exchanged $71.4 million of unsecured notes for about $29.3 million of secured notes. These…

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Let me start off by discussing our gross margin. As you can see on Slide 12 our gross margin has been in the single digits since the first quarter of 2008. Compared to the first quarter of 2008 our gross margin declined 100 basis points to 5.7% for the first quarter of 2009. However, gross margin increased sequentially by 100 basis points from the fourth quarter of 2008. This year-over-year decline is primarily the result of increased construction overhead as a percentage of home sales revenue. Despite the almost 70% in staffing reductions we’ve made since 2006, construction overheads increased 470 basis points year-over-year primarily as the result of the lower sales volume. Our gross margin before overhead actually increased 370 basis points to 16.1% for the first quarter of 2009 compared to the first quarter of 2008. During the first quarter of 2009 our home building cost of sales was reduced by $35.6 million from the reversal of impairments taken in prior periods. Turning to Slide 13 you can see our owned and optioned land supply broken out by our publically reported segments. There are some areas where we are more land heavy, these are generally the more supply constrained markets where we do a fair percentage of the land development ourselves, markets like New Jersey or California. In other markets like Texas we almost exclusively contract for finished lots, take land down on a just in time basis and therefore generally keep less owned land on our books. While we still own almost three years worth of land, the good news is that we don’t own as much land as some of our peers do on a comparable basis. Turning to Slide 14, you can see how our owned land position stacks up to those of our peers.…

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

In February Congress passed stimulus plan, unfortunately the final stimulus plan was essentially a non-event from housing’s perspective. Several minor changes were made to the tax credit that was put in place July of ’08, it increased the tax credit by $500 to $8,000, it no longer needed to be paid back and was extended to December of ’09 however, it still limited the credit to first time home buyers only. In some of our lower price communities, the $8,000 tax credit could be a significant percentage of the home price and could be more meaningful to someone who is undecided whether to purchase a home or not. Unfortunately, the overall dollar amount and the timing of the credit and the first time home buyer limitation significantly reduces the potential effectiveness of the tax credit. While the recent actions to mitigate foreclosures are helpful, the housing industry was disappointed in the stimulus bill due to the lack of providing any meaningful demand stimulus for home buyers. The housing industry was also hopeful for a meaningful reduction in mortgage rates in this stimulus bill. As you can see on Slide 23, while the Federal Reserve has aggressively lowered the federal funds rate to stimulate business, you can see that mortgage rates to stimulate home buyers have not nearly kept pace with the federal fund rate reduction. A meaningful tax credit and an interest rate buy down were key components of a stimulus package that the federal government used in 1975 to combat a difficult recession and housing market. Historically, the housing cycle has led us into and more important led us out of overall economic recessions. Unfortunately, our government has not taken similarly aggressive actions during this housing crisis so far. This lack of action to date will mean that even…

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan. Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan: The first question, we appreciate a lot the detail month-by-month that you gave on Slide Four in terms of the net contracts, I was hoping just for perspective from a year-over-year basis you could provide the last few months including February on the year ago basis on net orders and per community also?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

We don’t have that right at our finger tips, maybe by the end of the call or during the call we can gather that. Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan: That would obviously be pretty helpful given that you also had mentioned in the press release that you still feel at this point the increase is seasonal so I just wanted to try and get a little more color on that. The second question guys and then I’ll get back in to the queue, I was hoping if you could just talk a little bit more about your expectations for cash flow certainly guidance is extremely challenging but, given the year-over-year decline in the cash flow ex the tax refund, I just wanted to know your thoughts about whether ’09 could be a positive year or a negative year as you kind of look out the next couple of quarters at least?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Mike, it is challenging to make longer term projections on cash flow but looking at the first quarter Ara mentioned in his comments, you can’t just annualize the first quarter and assume that that is a meaningful number for any purpose. As he also said, we have negative cash flow in last year’s first quarter and then generated very strong cash flow for the full year. So, although I can understand why you’re focusing on this and wanting additional guidance I just don’t think anyone should go about trying to annualize our first quarter results. Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan: No I definitely wasn’t implying that and we recognize the seasonality but just given the year-over-year comparison and the fact that the backlog is down so significantly, that’s more where I was coming from.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

I understand. We’re not going to give a specific projection other than to tell you that we’re laser focused on generating positive cash flow the remainder of this year. I mean, there’s a lot of things that are out of our control in terms of what’s going to happen, the pace, what’s going to happen to prices but we remain laser like focused on generating cash flow that really drives virtually every decision that we make as a company and I just can’t give you any guidance at this time beyond that.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Carl Reichardt – Wachovia Securities. Carl Reichardt – Wachovia Securities: Can you tell me a little bit about how your traffic per community has been trending during the quarter Larry? And, can you also define when you take a community out of the community count what’s your definition of doing that since different builders do it different ways?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Our definition of doing that is I think there are 10 or less homes remaining to be sold. At the time that there’s less than 10 remaining in the community we take it out of our official count although as you well know since you track it from our website it will still be on the website because we still might have seven, or six, or five, or four homes to sell. But, that’s how we do it. I mean traffic seasonally has picked up as well. I don’t have it right in front of me on a per community basis. I would say it’s probably following the same pattern – I’m going to try and give you the contract data that Mike asked for earlier and I think traffic has followed that same kind of pattern so we have had a pickup in traffic compared to what we were having in the fall. Carl Reichardt – Wachovia Securities: So what you’d expect seasonally but is the traffic level changed much from the up sales per store place slightly has the slightly sort of increase similarly on a per store basis or greater than that?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

I think it’s probably a similar pace. Carl Reichardt – Wachovia Securities: Last question, Ara you’ve talked the last couple of quarters a little bit about some of the additional avenues you’ve pursued for capital or joint investment and land in communities going forward, could you give us sort of an update on where you see that environment right now? The appetite for outsiders to invest in this business and anything you guys might be entertaining, if it’s changed?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

There hasn’t been a lot of change. There continues to be an appetite, the real issue has been good investment opportunities so it becomes a little bit of the chicken or the egg. The good news is finally we are seeing land opportunities that make sense and for the first time in years other than Texas we have bid on a few parcels. We didn’t get any of those parcels but we were very close and the bids were at prices, all of them were from banks by the way, they were at prices dramatically below cost, I mean $0.15 to $0.17 on the dollar. At those prices it makes sound economic sense in today’s environment. But, in any case as I’ve mentioned we haven’t landed any of them just yet. I am optimistic that we are going to see an increase in good opportunities. The opportunities we’ve seen all ready presented themselves in the last few months. It’s the first time in one or two years where we’ve seen any reasonable opportunities and I clearly get the sense that there are more coming up so that is good progress. Once we get the opportunities, that’s when we’ll put the full court press on finalizing deals with a partner.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Before the next question I can answer Mike Rehaut’s question now, I’ve got the data by month for ’07 and I’m going to start, and this is on Slide Four for the monthly net contracts per community. For the month of November, 2007 we had .9 contracts per community compared to the 1.1 that we had in November of ’08. In December ’07 we had 1.4 net contracts per community compared to the 1.1 in ’08. In January of ’08 we had 1.3 net contracts per community compared to the 1.5 in January ’09. In February ’08 we had 1.8 net contracts per community compared to the 2.2 in February ’09. Then starting with October of ’07 we had 226 contracts compared to the 231 in October ’08 but I will just tell you that ’07 was impacted to a large extent by the September ’07 deal of the century so we think we pulled some demand forward a year ago. In November of ’07 we had 386 net contracts compared to 284 in November ’08. In December of ’07 we had 582 net contracts compared to 304 in December ’08. In January of ’08 we had 543 net contracts compared to 373 in January of ’09. February of ’08 we had 804 net contracts compared to 506 in February ’09.

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

Obviously the absolute number of sales is more challenging because we’ve reduced the community count dramatically. But, as you can see by these comparisons the sales per community are showing an improved trend finally over last year.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from David Goldberg – UBS. David Goldberg – UBS: First question is Ara, if we go back to your comments on the decision make process on building or not building and the recoverability test and how you guys think about that I’m wondering if you can kind of give us an idea what the range might be in terms of recoverability of current investment? What might be the low where you would decide to build through it and obviously, the max would be 100% but what might be the low and kind of some examples and just some more color around the actual decision making process? I guess with that, not to go overly complex here but, with that how you think about what would have to happen to prices if you decide not to go ahead and build through, what the expectation for pricing to make it worthwhile to hold the communities or hold the land?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

I mean the thinking varies a bit by community. If we’re in some parts of the market like a Bakersfield or a Fresno or parts of Florida that we feel are oversupplied then we’ll come down to low lot recoveries, $15,000 or $20,000 per lot. If we can recover that by building a house then we’ll continue to do that on the bottom end. In other examples if they are our prime locations with a shortage of land and markets just at the moment can’t justify the price then we might mothball a community or not to go forward if it generates substantially more cash flow per lot than that. But, that’s part of the thinking, it’s kind of tempered by what we perceive as the near or intermediate term future based on land supply there. David Goldberg – UBS: Just to clarify that, the $15,000 or $20,000 on the low end, what would the finished lot cost be there? What percent of that would that be of the finished lot cost?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

It’s all over the board. I mean it could be as low as 20% of the finished lot cost and obviously that’s why we’re generating some of the low margins that we’re generating or if you go down that far in price that’s why we’re booking the impairments in those cases. David Goldberg – UBS: I guess the second question as opposed to the build or no build in open communities –

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

And by the way, the other positive of doing that in addition to generating cash flow is you build through our older valued lots so that we can make room to replenish our land supply at better valuations. David Goldberg – UBS: I guess the second question, it’s along the same lines but it specifically relates to the mothballed communities and the $500 million plus land that you have in the mothballed communities, I guess I’m trying to figure out how much prices would have to go up from where we are to make that, or maybe sales base, if you can give us some sort of idea what would make those projects viable? Then, what goes in to the impairment analysis because you’ve written off at the masses right here about 36% of the original invested value in impairments in those communities and it seems like a low number given that we’re not at pricing now that would sustain opening up the communities?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

The answer is all over the place. Obviously, it depends on the community and it depends on the status of land development and also when we put it in to mothball. But, there are clearly examples where it doesn’t take a lot of price appreciation or velocity. Remember, both of those are taken in to account. There are definitely cases where it wouldn’t take a lot to get it out of the mothball status for us. But, there’s not simple or easy answer. Clearly, prices have come down in many of our locations 40%, if we could recover 10% of that 40% there are many cases where it might justify reigniting a mothballed community.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Dan Oppenheim – Credit Suisse. Dan Oppenheim – Credit Suisse: I was wondering if you can talk about your comment on being very focused on cash flow at the expense of margins as it relates to the Northeast? Looking at the investment in lots in your K, and sort of adjusting for the impairments this quarter, it looks as though you’ve got in your planned communities $145,000 of investment per lot in the Northeast whereas every other region maxed out at about $40,000 per lot in the West. Given the weak demand in the Northeast, should we expect lower pricing and significant impairments to come on that?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

Well, you’re comparing an apple and an orange. On the West most of our land holdings remain in very inexpensive areas, in the Inland Empire, in the outskirts of Sacramento and then Bakersfield where the land values are just very low. Conversely in the New Jersey market in the Northeast near the New York Metropolitan area or in the core areas of New Jersey, the values are dramatically higher. So, it’s a bit of an apple and an orange.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Having said that, our impairments during the first quarter Dan were weighted towards the Northeast and specifically New Jersey because we have seen some price erosion based on what’s happened on Wall Street since September, so we make the analysis based on the facts at the time of each quarter end and make the adjustments accordingly.

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

If you also look as part of our release the average price in net contracts, I think it says that pretty well, in the West it was $166,000, in the Northeast it was $470,000, triple the price so that’s also part of the rationale.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Nishu Sood – Deutsche Bank Securities. Nishu Sood – Deutsche Bank Securities: I wanted to ask first about your debt repurchases which obviously stepped up in importance here. I wanted to get your thoughts, your kind of goals, your strategies that are guiding you here specifically I would like to understand how much cash you intend to allocate to the debt repurchases, how you’re altering your maturity structure, which maturities you’re targeting for repurchase and whether or not the repurchases you’re doing here are opportunistic, you know transactions that are coming to you or whether you’re going out and seeking them?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

I think really all we’re going to say about that is what we said in the script and that is that we gave the detail on what we have done very recently. We have a very limited amount of cash which I’m not going to define specifically as to how much more we’re willing to do but I can assure you that it’s limited because we need to preserve our liquidity and I think I’m just going to leave it at that. Nishu Sood – Deutsche Bank Securities: Maybe you can give us just maybe your thoughts on the questions asked on what has happened to date already? Like, which maturities are you buying, whether they were opportunistic or whether they came to you? Just in terms of what has happened already.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

What’s actually happened already, we’ll put out incrementally more data when we file our 10Q later this afternoon, we’ll break it out between sub debt and senior debt but we’re just not giving any granularity on specifically what issue, what amount, that kind of thing. Nishu Sood – Deutsche Bank Securities: The next question I wanted to ask was about gross margins, at this stage in the downturn, at this stage in the impairment cycle we’re seeing obviously a larger amount of previous impairments flow back through gross margins, you’re gross margins seem to have kind of stabilized in the let’s say the 5% to 7% range but your peers though generally have been coming in at about 11% to 13%. So, I was just wondering maybe if you could give us your thoughts on what the differential is there?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

I think part of it could be related to the fact that we’ve got and have had a fair amount of activity in California and Florida which has some terrible margins. Part of it is also related to the fact that we are more focused on cash flow and more willing I think to accept lower margins in returns for sales velocity. You can see that by the fact that while our sales were dismal in the first quarter with a -36% it was the third best or fourth best in the industry when you look at the 12 or 13 public builders. Part of the reason we were able to do that and not have our sales decline as much I suspect is that we were a little more aggressive and therefore were willing to take the pricing hits. As I mentioned with the California and Florida, we just have a greater portion of our assets in some of the very tough markets.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Megan Talbott McGrath – Barclays Capital. Megan Talbott McGrath – Barclays Capital: I just wanted to follow up a little bit more on the cash flow, Larry you mentioned – I realize that you don’t want to give guidance but you mentioned that you are going to be laser focused so I’m wondering if you can give us any more thoughts about what you can do? You talked about what’s out of your control but what are the things that are in your control? Did you have discretionary land spend this quarter that you can pull back? Does it make sense to be more aggressive on pricing over the next couple of quarters?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Well, I think you’ve seen us be aggressive on pricing to the extent that we can still make a decent recovery of our current improved lot cost by selling a house. If we’ve got to discount the house and still can recover a decent amount of the lot cost as Ara defined a few minutes ago, we’ll continue to do that to the extent that the market dictates that we have to do that in order to sell homes. That’s been our strategy, it’s going to continue to be our strategy throughout this downturn. The other thing that we continue to do is obviously monitor very carefully all of our overhead costs and you see every quarter although these decisions are extremely difficult to make but, as business slows down we have to continue to right size our business and you’ll see that happen as appropriate in individual markets as well. We’re just focused on preserving cash in every way that we can. There’s a certain amount of land development work that we just have to do. In Texas, one of the better markets in the country, we have optioned finished lots so we’re selling well, we have decent margins there and we’ll continue to spend money on land as we sell homes on the lots that we currently own in specific communities so we can’t stop taking down land in a market where we’re getting a good return on our capital. Megan Talbott McGrath – Barclays Capital: Ara, just to follow up, in your initial comments I think you very briefly mentioned that you took down some lots as part of a redesign of several communities. Is that something you’re doing firm wide?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

No, what we were saying is if you simply took the lot purchases and compared it with the deliveries and lot sales, you couldn’t quite get to the number of lots we ended up with and that’s because on some existing lots that we own or land that we own, the product was redesigned giving us more lots without buying more land. I was just trying to explain that.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from [Timothy Jones - Weselin & Associates]. [Timothy Jones - Weselin & Associates]: Just a follow up first of all with what was asked to you on that buy back of debt, can you at least say has it been bought from debt holders or banks?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

I’m sorry has it been bought from who? [Timothy Jones - Weselin & Associates]: Public debt holders or banks?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

They’ve all been from debt holders. [Timothy Jones - Weselin & Associates]: Okay, the first question is on your covenants now what are your most stringent? Especially tangible net worth and debt to capital and does this $210 million gain in the second quarter, do the banks take it in full faith?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

We don’t have any tangible net worth covenants either on our bank debt or any of our public debt. We really don’t have any maintenance covenants such as a minimum net worth or fixed charge coverage on any of our debt.

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

Basically when we switched to a secure facility and reduced the amount, by the way we don’t have anything borrowed on our credit facility, but we exchanged that in return for very lenient covenants. [Timothy Jones - Weselin & Associates]: But the banks will give you credit for this gain that you’ve got from buying back this debt early in the second quarter?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

There’s no covenant that’s related to it. They certainly count it as equity. [Timothy Jones - Weselin & Associates]: The second one, you gave us the specs this year versus last year, can you give us either the total homes under construction including the specs and I can take the ones that are not spec out of it? Either non-specs or give me the total, either one it doesn’t make a difference.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Clearly, I don’t have that number at our finger tips and it’s not something that we’ve ever given out before. Call me afterwards and we can talk about it Tim.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Alex Barron – Agency Trading Group. Alex Barron – Agency Trading Group: I was wondering if you could talk about your restrictive payments basket? I’m just trying to get a sense of is there some kind of max amount of debt you can repurchase?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

All the information regarding limitation on our restrictive payments you can find in the SEC filings for each of our debt issues. There are several different baskets with different kind of limitations that are available to us under the limitations. They are pretty complex and I think the important thing is that we remain in compliance of all those restrictive payment baskets and expect to continue to remain in compliance with all of our debt covenants. I think that’s what you need to understand. Alex Barron – Agency Trading Group: My second question was you talk a little bit about I guess in some communities there are maintenance costs and taxes and so forth, do you have some estimate of what that amount is for this fiscal year?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

No, we don’t break out that level of detail.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

I mean we have it built in to our models but we don’t have a break out of that to provide you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question will come from [Joel Locker – FB&C Securities]. [Joel Locker – FB&C Securities]: Just on the job or actually the 506 orders that you took in February, how many of the orders were taken with the mortgage in case you lose your jobs, six months per year or whatever it is?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

We only recently started offering that probably within the last three weeks, four weeks so I’m not sure how many of the 500 in February were that way but the program is getting some interest and it’s able to overcome the objection for some of the customers but I don’t think it’s a primary driver of why we got 506. [Joel Locker – FB&C Securities]: How would that run through or which line item would you take a reserve immediately? Through COGS when you take an order?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

We go to a third party insurance provider to get that. We just pay an insurance premium so to speak so it doesn’t affect our ability to book the revenues or anything. [Joel Locker – FB&C Securities]: And that would go through other expenses. Paul W. Buchanan The insurance premium itself would be in cost of sales as part of closing costs.

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

It’s very modest.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Lee Brading – Wachovia Securities. Lee Brading – Wachovia Securities: I wanted to follow up on just the balancing act you’re doing on the land spend side because Ara one comment you made is that land is starting to make sense, you did a bid in Texas and Larry you made a comment it’s a race to zero yet it still looks like you have too much land that you own in general. What I kind of gather and looking at your Slide 13, I guess Texas would fall within that Southwest, a pretty low relative to your overall company in amount of years of lots owned. Is it very targeted geographically where you’re looking to buy land or is it broader than that?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

It’s broader. First, just a clarification, the race to zero is on the land that we have on our books that was purchased at higher valuations. But, in terms of the current lot options that have been done, that’s been primarily focused in Texas and that’s been on an improved lot rolling take down basis. So, we’re basically buying two or three lots at a time if we get sales, then you buy another two or three lots and it turns relatively quickly with little exposure. Regarding the overall larger picture for looking for land opportunities we’re looking really across all of our markets and as we’ve mentioned, our focus is to do that without using up a huge amount of our capital by finding joint venture partners. To the extent we already have a land supply obviously, we wouldn’t purchase the identical kind of parcel but there are many opportunities in many different geographies and many different products so even though we may have a larger land position than we’d like today based on old land holdings or old land purchases in DC, that doesn’t mean that we wouldn’t look at a new opportunity at a price that works today and generates a profit. So, at the same time we’re continuing to sell some of our old land, we may have a new location or a new product, or perhaps our land is for 75 foot lots and we have a new product opportunity four towns over with 40 foot lots then we’d consider looking at those opportunities. Lee Brading – Wachovia Securities: Then just on the interest expense side, just the timing of that, I know you disclosed interest occurred was about $50 million or so but if I was just looking at it I guess from the standpoint of the bond payments, you ended up making about $90 million in payments this past quarter, is that about right?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

The bond payments are weighted towards the first and third quarters, they are dramatically higher, dramatically than the second and fourth quarters. As a clarification I think the bond interest payments was a little over $80 million in the first quarter and would be significantly less, significantly less in the second quarter.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan. Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan: I just had a quick follow up, more of a clarification from earlier, you had said that you mothballed 13 communities during the quarter and I wasn’t sure if the 531, I assumed that’s related to a larger number of communities and I was wondering if you could maybe give a little more color in terms of maybe geographic breakdown? Paul W. Buchanan 65 total mothballed communities for that. Michael Rehaut – JP Morgan: Any sense of geographically how that 531 breaks apart?

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

Not, we don’t break that out geographically.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from [Michael Lynn – Fairlawn]. [Michael Lynn – Fairlawn]: My question was what the amount of the RP basket was under the secured 11.5% notes pro forma for your buys?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

There are several different baskets so I don’t know, which one are you talking about? [Michael Lynn – Fairlawn]: I guess the obvious question is you’ve spent $140 million on bonds in the open market under the 11.5% indenture which I assume would be the most restrictive, how much more could you spend if you wanted to?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

The answer is not that straight forward and I could just repeat the answer I gave earlier but it stands. If you want to really understand our restrictive payment baskets you probably ought to go look at the SEC filings. We remain in compliance with all of those baskets, it’s fairly complex and we intend to remain in compliance going forward as well.

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

In general it’s not unlimited by any stretch. We do have more opportunities. I would say our own internal caution would be the more restrictive factor right now than the basket. But, that basket does change over time and that’s why Larry mentioned it’s not a straight forward or a simple calculation.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Larry Taylor – Credit Suisse. Larry Taylor – Credit Suisse: I wonder if you guys could share, even if it’s not an exact number, give us some sense of the sort of level of cash that is your comfort level? I mean, you kept cash about flat during the quarter notwithstanding whatever happened with operations, you spent some on debt repurchase since, is there a level? Is it $500 million, is it $300 million, is it $700 million? Do you see where I’m going with that?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

Yes and that’s a difficult question to answer. Obviously, more is better and stating the obvious there but, how long is the downturn going to last? It would be easier to answer that question but we’re focused that the most important thing to our ability to weather this down turn is having sufficient liquidity which means sufficient cash. So, we’re very cautious on depleting that and I don’t think I can give you much more clarity than that Larry.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Susan Berliner – JP Morgan. Susan Berliner – JP Morgan: Larry, I guess if I could ask that question a little bit differently in trying to figure out the restrictive payment basket which I guess a lot of people are having difficulty. I guess when you guys look at the collateral package that secures the 11.5, I know you had gotten an appraisal, is there any way to give kind of an approximation of what the collateral is and should we include cash in that number as well? What kind of a cushion is there?

J. Larry Sorsby

Management

You can include cash in the calculation and I’m just not going to be able to give you any specifics beyond that. But, I will tell you that cash is included.

Operator

Operator

At this time I see no further questions in queue. I would like to turn the call back over to Ara Hovnanian for closing remarks.

Ara K. Hovnanian

Management

Thank you very much. It’s obviously a challenging environment. We wish we had even better news to give you but, we continue to work hard, focus on cash flow and we look forward to reporting to you next quarter.

Operator

Operator

Thank you for your participation in today’s conference. This concludes the conference. You may now disconnect. Good day.