Property taxes in N.J. rise 2.4 percent despite state-imposed cap

New Jersey’s highest-in-the-nation property taxes continued to rise in 2011, although at a slower rate than in previous years, according to figures released by the state Department of Community Affairs.

The average annual property tax bill was up $183 from 2010 to 2011, to $7,759. That’s an increase of 2.4 percent, slightly more than half the 4.1 percent increase seen between 2009 and 2010.
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In Monmouth County, the average property tax bill rose $248, to $8,040. That’s a 3.2 percent increase. Ocean County property owners saw their taxes jump an average of $618, to $5,434. That’s an increase of nearly 13 percent.
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Statewide, Paterson saw the highest property tax increase, at 17.3 percent to $8,829, for municipalities with more than 250 residents. Corbin City, in Atlantic County, had biggest drop, at 20.6 percent. The town has about 500 residents, and homeowners paid an average of $3,328 in property taxes.

Over the years the state has attempted to mitigate some of the rise in property taxes by distributing rebates to property owners. Rebate checks, previously mailed in October, averaged about $1,000 during Gov. Jon S. Corzine’s administration.

From the Courier Post:

Hey guv, it’s still property taxes

Gov. Chris Christie may not be the kind of leader who drifts whichever way the wind blows and changes his position based on polls.

But, if polls weren’t important to some degree as a barometer of voters’ opinions, then politicians wouldn’t rely so heavily upon them come campaign season.

An interesting new poll from Monmouth University/New Jersey Press Media finds that when it comes to lowering property taxes or lowering income taxes in the Garden State, a vast majority — 69 percent — think lowering property taxes should be the priority. Just 19 percent of poll respondents said reducing the state income tax should be the priority. Another 10 percent of those polled said both should be the priority.
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As Christie turns the corner on the halfway point of his first term and prepares for a potential re-election bid in 2013, or a bid to some national office later, it’s understandable why he wants to lower state income taxes by 10 percent. New Jerseyans are overburdened by taxes and, for the governor, one of the least complicated taxes to lower is the income tax because it is directly controlled by the state.
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The 2 percent cap on local government spending increases and property tax levy increases year-to-year was a great achievement. But, it has not lowered anyone’s property taxes. The cap has only slowed the pace of the tax increases.

CoreLogic® Home Price Index Shows Fifth Consecutive Month-Over-Month Decline

Home prices in the U.S. decreased 1.4 percent on a month-over-month basis, the fifth consecutive monthly decline. However, the HPI excluding distressed sales posted its first month-over-month gain since July 2011, rising 0.2 percent. The CoreLogic HPI shows that, including distressed sales, home prices in the U.S. decreased 4.7 percent in 2011 compared with December 2010. This year-end report shows that home prices continued the trend of year-end decreases—this is the fifth consecutive year with a decrease in the HPI. The HPI excluding distressed sales shows that home prices decreased by 0.9 percent in 2011, giving an indication of the impact of distressed sales on home prices in 2011.

Highlights as of December 2011

Including distressed sales, the five states with the highest appreciation were: Montana (+4.4 percent), Vermont (+4.0 percent), South Dakota (+3.1 percent), Nebraska (+2.5 percent) and New York (+1.7 percent).

Including distressed sales, the five states with the greatest depreciation were: Illinois (-11.3 percent), Nevada (-10.6 percent), Georgia (-8.3 percent), Ohio (-7.7 percent), and Minnesota (-7.5 percent).

Excluding distressed sales, the five states with the highest appreciation were: Montana (+7.7 percent), South Dakota (+3.5 percent), Indiana (+3.3 percent), Alaska (+3.1 percent), and Massachusetts (+2.9 percent).

Excluding distressed sales, the five states with the greatest depreciation were: Nevada (-9.7 percent), Minnesota (-5.2 percent), Arizona (-4.9 percent), Delaware (-4.2 percent) and Michigan (-3.5 percent).

“While overall prices declined by almost 5 percent in 2011, non-distressed prices showed only a small decrease. Until distressed sales in the market recede, we will see continued downward pressure on prices,” said Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic.

Home Sales Up in December Making it 7 of the Last 8 Months

The New Jersey housing market continues to build momentum as it turned the corner into the new year. Combined purchase contracts for resales and new homes rose in December by 8% compared to one year ago which was the largest single monthly increase since June. That the rise in December, which is traditionally a slow period for home sales, was the largest of the year suggests a more robust spring selling season ahead.

Region’s home prices drop 2.3%

Home prices in the New York metropolitan area, including North Jersey, dropped 2.3 percent in November, compared with a year earlier, the Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller index reported Tuesday. Nationally, prices dropped 3.7 percent.

Prices in the region have fallen 23 percent since the market peak in 2006, and are back to early 2004 levels. Nationally, prices have declined 33 percent since the peak, and are back to the levels of mid-2003.
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In Bergen County, the median price of a single-family home fell 8 percent, to a median $400,000 in November, while the number of sales dropped about 3 percent. In Passaic, prices dropped 8.4 percent, to a median $288,500, while the number of sales dropped 13.7 percent.

These numbers are from the N.J. and Garden State multiple listing services, and reflect the mix of properties sold during the month. Case-Shiller does not break down data by county, but its numbers are considered more accurate because it tracks the value of the same properties over time.
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“The trend is down, and there are few, if any, signs in the numbers that a turning point is close at hand.”

— David M. Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at Standard & Poor’s

“With the prospect of rising foreclosures — as the legal and administrative issues are resolved — we can expect the downward pressure on prices to increase in the coming months, despite historically low mortgage rates.”

— Patrick O’Keefe, an economist with J.H. Cohn in Roseland

“There’s been a substantial decline in prices in the New York metropolitan area, but that’s not quite enough to bring prices back in line with household income levels. By the summer of 2012, home prices in the area are expected to fall an additional 7.7 percent.”

— David Stiff, economist, Fiserv Inc.

NJs economy picks up as NYCs slows

As New York State’s economic activity has leveled off, New Jersey’s has picked up — and the state job market is stronger than the unemployment rate of 9 percent suggests, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

New Jersey’s economy has generally been less healthy than that of New York City and state since the recession ended. In July, the city’s jobless rate was 8.6 percent, and New York State’s was 8 percent, compared with 9.5 percent in New Jersey.

New Jersey’s growth was “quite robust” in the last three months of 2011, while New York State has seen only “minimal job gains” since August, William C. Dudley, the bank’s president, said at its quarterly briefing on Friday.

“In contrast, New Jersey’s economy, which was sluggish throughout 2010 and into the first half of 2011, has picked up noticeably,” he said.

The unemployment rate in New Jersey and New York City is the same — 9 percent for December — and New York State’s is 8 percent.

The bank president’s comments came a week after New Jersey released figures showing the state added 39,400 private-sector jobs in 2011, the largest annual increase since 2000. The state’s jobless rate still lags behind the national rate of 8.5 percent.

Jason Bram, an economist for the federal bank, said New Jersey’s unemployment rate would likely be lower, except for the strong influx of people into the state labor force.

“In New Jersey, it’s really much better than it would appear,” Bram said. “More people who weren’t in the labor force are looking for a job.”

People who had stopped looking for work are now more optimistic and are looking again, Bram said.

He said Bergen, Hudson and Passaic counties added jobs at a faster rate than the national employment increase of 0.7 percent from June to December last year. New York City also increased employment faster than the nation in that period, he said.

Christie Pushes Income-Tax Cut as Democrats Eye Property Levies

Governor Chris Christie told a group of business leaders that Democrats in the Legislature may jeopardize New Jersey’s economic recovery by putting social issues ahead of job-creation and tax cuts.
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“They want to play around with social issues to try and make people look bad,” Christie said. “Here’s what the public is going to care about: Are they working? Are they working in a job that pays well and provides their family with health insurance?”

Christie’s remarks echoed his Jan. 17 State of the State speech to the Legislature and a subsequent series of public meetings in which he pressed his case for hastening what he calls “the Jersey comeback” by cutting taxes. The Washington- based Tax Foundation yesterday ranked New Jersey last among U.S. states in terms of business climate.
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Assembly Majority Leader Louis Greenwald, a Cherry Hill Democrat, said his party is weighing “a couple of ideas” to lower pressure from New Jersey’s highest-in-the-nation property taxes. He declined to give specifics following Christie’s speech, while saying any relief would be both immediate and long-term.
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Christie took office in 2010 pledging to cut taxes as the state’s economic conditions improved. He said his proposed reduction would spur the state’s economy, which he added should be the top issue in Trenton.

“Do they care about the stuff we’ve been talking about for the past week?” Christie said, referring to state residents. “What they care about is whether their husband or wife will have a job, will they have money to put food on the table?”

The governor has so far declined to say how he’d make up for the revenue if taxes are cut. Democrats have said a 10 percent rollback may mean as much as a $1.1 billion decline in state receipts.
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“People care about civil rights, and they also care about the middle-class property tax relief and job creation plans this governor vetoed as he zealously protects and advocates for tax cuts for the rich,” Tom Hester, a spokesman for Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver, said last night. “His priorities are so out of step with working class New Jersey.”

Oliver, a Democrat from East Orange, has said that an analysis by her office showed a family with a $50,000 annual income would pay $80 less in taxes under Christie’s plan, while someone earning $1 million would save $7,200.

One in 12 N.J. home sales was a foreclosure in third quarter

About one in every 12 New Jersey home sales in the third quarter of 2011 involved foreclosed properties — a steep drop from the previous year, according to RealtyTrac, a California company that follows the foreclosure market.

Nationally, foreclosure sales made up 20 percent of sales in the third quarter, down from 30 percent in the same period a year earlier.

Lenders have sharply pulled back on foreclosure activity since fall 2010, when reports arose that lenders’ representatives were “robo-signing” affidavits and other documents — signing them so quickly they couldn’t be verified. Lenders are now trying to show courts in New Jersey and other states that they are not cutting corners in foreclosures. And state attorneys general are close to a settlement with lenders over their foreclosure practices.

“Even with the hurdles to selling foreclosures, foreclosure sales continue to represent a historically high percentage of all sales,” said Brandon Moore, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. “In 2005 and 2006, foreclosure sales consistently accounted for less than 5 percent of all sales nationwide.”
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Foreclosed properties typically sell at a steep discount, which tends to pull down the prices of competing properties. In New Jersey, foreclosed properties sold for an average of $208,801 in the third quarter, a 38 percent discount to regular properties. Nationally, foreclosed properties sold for an average $165,322, a 34 percent discount, RealtyTrac said.

“The sooner the market gets more clarity about accepted foreclosure procedures, primarily through the long-promised settlement between multiple states attorneys general and major lenders, the sooner the market can more efficiently dispose of these distressed properties,” Moore said.

N.J. jobless rate drops to 9%, lowest since May 2009

New Jersey’s unemployment rate in December dropped 0.1 percent to 9 percent, the lowest jobless rate in the state since May 2009, 31 months ago.

And while the state’s unemployment rate has declined in four of the last five months, that is not welcome news to the 7,200 New Jerseyans who lost their jobs in the private sector. Another 7,300 people found work, including 2,400 who obtained public employment, mainly in municipal and county governments.

Job losses occurred in construction 2,800, manufacturing 200, trade, transportation and utilities 4,100, and leisure and hospitality 100. Job gains were made in financial activities 1,800, professional and business services 1,500, other services 1,300, and education and health services 300.

The number of New Jerseyans who had jobs at the end of last month was 3,881,100. Another 410,700 are unemployed.

“The numbers show that 2011 was the best year for private sector job growth since the year 2000,” state Chief Economist Charles Steindel said. “We still have a long way to go to get back close to full employment, but it’s evident we are going in the right direction.”

From the Record:

NJ adds 400 jobs in December

New Jersey added just 400 jobs in December and unemployment fell slightly in a weak finish to a year in which the state added a relatively healthy 39,400 private sector jobs.

The state lost 2,000 private sector jobs and added 2,400 government jobs, according to the monthly jobs report by the Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

Unemployment, fell from 9.1 percent to 9 percent, leaving it still above the national rate of 8.5 percent.

For the year, the state added a total of 36,400 jobs, losing 3,000 government positions.
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The report also revised downwards the previously released figures for November, reporting 10,000 jobs added, instead of 10,300.

Gov. Christie takes rosy look at state revenues

By calling for a 10 percent income tax cut, Gov. Chris Christie must believe boom times are coming to state finances.

Because with the scheduled increases for pension payments and transportation funding, it will take tax revenue jumps of 4 percent or 5 percent a year — or smaller increases combined with further state budget cuts — to pay for the proposed tax cut that would eventually reach some $1.2 billion or more.

It was hard for most analysts and experts to see that scenario on Wednesday as the state reported that tax collections for the current budget were $325.7 million, or 3.2 percent, under the administration’s own expectations.

Meanwhile, New Jersey is required by law, under reforms Christie enacted, to pay $484 million toward its pension system by June 30, and then dramatically increase that contribution to $1 billion in the next fiscal year and $5 billion by fiscal year 2016.

“The governor set out a laudable goal of reducing the tax burden, but I would caution that we do it in a prudent way,” said Raphael J. Caprio, a professor of public administration at Rutgers University who was part of a group that issued a dire report on state finances last year.

“As we phase in tax cuts, we will be phasing in pension liabilities and other obligations. We need to careful of undermining one at the expense of the other,” Caprio said.

In addition to pension costs, the state plans to spend $8 billion, through 2016, for the Transportation Trust Fund, which pays for large-scale bridge and road repairs, new trains and rail, and other major projects.
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Private estimates Wednesday pegged the Christie tax cut as a $150 million cost to the upcoming budget, then grow to $350 million in fiscal 2014 and $950 million in fiscal 2015 before being fully implemented at $1.2 billion a year later.

From Bottom Up, Signs of Housing Recovery

After years of watching home prices slide, Claudia Ruggiero, a teacher in White Plains, was ready to strike.

She and her husband Michael Johnson, also a teacher, had a 14-month-old son at home and needed a shorter commute. They found a three-bedroom Dutch colonial in Armonk, a neighborhood they thought they could never afford, for a bit more than $500,000.

In a strong sign of recovery in the housing market, cost-conscious buyers such as Ms. Ruggiero have stormed back into the market for lower-priced properties across the New York area in recent months, leading analysts to speculate that the worst of the housing slump may be over.

Across Westchester, the number of buyers in contract to buy homes priced less than $500,000 at the end of 2011 rose by nearly 40% compared to a year earlier, according to a market report issued by the broker Houlihan Lawrence. Sales weakened at higher price points.

Analysts have noted a similar pattern in New Jersey. Sales have picked up due to buyers of properties priced less than $400,000, according to data compiled by the Otteau Valuation Group. The number of such contracts signed during the fourth quarter rose by 11.3% compared to the same period a year earlier.

Analysts said housing-market recoveries often begin at the bottom.

“It is nice when you get the high end of the market doing well,” said Chris Meyers, chief operating officer of Houlihan Lawrence, the largest residential brokerage in Westchester, “but in our experience the strong markets get healthy from the bottom up.”

Jeffrey G. Otteau, an appraiser and housing analyst in New Jersey, said that state’s market had “bottomed out.” He said the surge in lower-end sales strengthened month by month since September. It was, he said, like a “snowball, rolling down hill and gaining momentum” that was likely to continue in 2012.

He attributed the change to an improved economy, with the creation of entry-level jobs triggering home buying by first time homebuyers backed by support from federal housing programs. A bump down in mortgage rates was also a factor, brokers said.

Rural Areas Slower to Rebound

FOR whatever reason, homes sales picked up in New Jersey in the latter part of 2011. A new statewide market report shows contract signings increased in six of the seven months from May through November, compared with 2010.

Also, the inventory of homes for sale shrank every month since May, according to Jeffrey G. Otteau, an analyst, whose Otteau Valuation Group in East Brunswick does monthly reports for the real estate industry; he called the latest news a concrete sign that the market was “stabilizing.”

His December report was the first one in several years to sound a hopeful note. Until the state’s huge foreclosure backlog comes back on the market — and how fast that happens is important — the market may improve sometime this year to the point that prices stop declining and perhaps even modestly start to rise.

But that is the statewide picture. A great division in market fortunes between northern and southern Jersey — and urbanized areas close to Manhattan and more rural regions — became clear during the recent recession and remains stark in the fresh statistics. Mr. Otteau predicted that the gap would shape the timing and pattern of potential recovery, and several agents in the field agreed with him.

“Simply put,” said Dawn Rapa, a Coldwell Banker Elite agent working in rural Salem County, “the only people I’ve seen selling their houses recently are those who absolutely had to — because they were in financial disarray, a job change, divorce or death.”

Salem County, rich in historic houses and farmland but short on well-paying jobs or a quick commute to an urban center, has the largest inventory of all 21 counties surveyed: 44.5 months’ worth of houses, the preponderance of them priced under $400,000.
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Several other counties in southern New Jersey have inventories about twice the size of the state average — 29 months’ worth in Cumberland County, 26 in Cape May County, and 24 in Atlantic County.

In Cape May and Atlantic, the primary backlog is for more expensive homes, many of them built in the boom years to appeal to shoreline vacationers. Atlantic has just shy of six years’ worth of inventory in the $600,000-to-$1 million range.

For homes priced from $1 million to $2.5 million, the Otteau report predicted, it will take more than four years to sell the inventory in Atlantic County and close to seven years in Ocean County.
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The market misery is not all concentrated in the south, however. In the northernmost county, Sussex, the inventory is 20 months. In the $400,000-to-$599,999 bracket, five and a half years’ supply is already on the market.

In the town of Vernon, which is home to several popular ski areas, and where construction was booming in the mid-2000s, the average sale price of a home was $250,000 in 2007, according to the real estate Web site Trulia. Now the site has it at $100,000.
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Nearby in the somewhat more affluent town of Sparta, a number of large houses built about a decade ago on one-acre or larger lots are now being offered at reduced prices or as short sales.

“Houses are selling,” said Catherine Kut, an agent at Weichert Realtors in Sparta, “but they have to be in fabulous condition and still occupied, as a rule.

Beige Book – Second District–New York

The Second District’s economy has grown at a somewhat faster pace since the last report, led by brisk holiday-season spending. Labor market conditions, as well as prices, have remained generally stable. Manufacturers report modestly improved general business conditions and steady employment since the last report, along with increased optimism about the near-term outlook. Retailers generally characterize holiday season spending as robust, particularly in the final days before Christmas and right after. Auto dealers report that sales have remained strong since the last report. Tourism activity has held steady at a high level. Conditions have generally remained stable in the housing market, though the rental market has continued to improve. Commercial real estate markets have been stable to moderately stronger in late 2011. Finally, bankers report increased loan demand, steady to somewhat tighter credit standards, and lower delinquency rates across the board.
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Construction and Real Estate

Residential rental markets continue to strengthen, while real estate sales have shown little change since the last report and new development activity continues to be sluggish. New York City’s rental market remains tight: rents continue to rise, as the inventory of available units remains lean. Manhattan co-op and condo prices were little changed in the fourth quarter, while sales activity slowed from its fairly brisk third quarter pace. Market conditions were reported to be similar in Brooklyn but a bit softer in the other boroughs and on Long Island. On a more positive note, one industry expert in New Jersey sees improved fundamentals in the housing market and foresees a pickup in market conditions in 2012. Real estate contacts in other parts of the District also note some increase in optimism among developers.

Commercial real estate markets have been steady to somewhat stronger since the last report. New York City’s office market has picked up in late 2011, with office vacancy rates edging down and asking rents rising. There were also modest signs of improvement in Westchester and Fairfield counties and in the Albany area, whereas office markets in northern New Jersey and western New York State appear to have slackened modestly. Industrial leasing markets were generally steady overall: conditions firmed in Long Island but showed some signs of softening across upstate New York; in the rest of the District, conditions were little changed.

CoreLogic® Home Price Index Shows Fourth Consecutive Month-Over-Month Decline – Home Prices Down 4.3 Percent Year-Over-Year

Special Report: Did N.J. property tax reform help most taxpayers?

New Jersey homeowners paid an average of 2.4 percent more for property taxes in 2011, the smallest increase in nearly two decades, showing Gov. Chris Christie’s push to restrain local levies might be working.

A Star-Ledger analysis of taxes in all 566 New Jersey towns shows the average property tax bill was $7,758 last year, an increase of about $182 from 2010.

Although more than 82 percent of the towns saw some increase in their average property tax bills last year, the 2.4 percent increase was a significantly slower rate of growth, the newspaper found. In 2010, property taxes rose 4.1 percent and year-over-year increases topped 7 percent for three consecutive years in the middle of the past decade.

The last time property taxes rose by such a small rate was 1992, when they went up 1.9 percent, according to state figures.

Christie has made reining in New Jersey’s highest-in-the-nation property taxes a big goal of his administration. Along with the Democrat-controlled Legislature, he limited property tax collections for towns, schools and counties at 2 percent, starting last January.

“Am I satisfied? Of course not. Unless you told me it was 2 percent, I wouldn’t be satisfied,” Christie said in an interview. “But we’re making great progress. When you think that in the 10 years before I became governor, property taxes went up 70 percent in 10 years and now people are talking about 2-and-change increase, that’s great progress and progress that nobody else before we got here created in this state.”
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The analysis found:

• In total, towns, counties and schools collected about $25.6 billion from taxpayers in 2011, a 2.5 percent increase from 2010.

• Loch Arbour Village in Monmouth County had the highest average property tax bill at $22,715. Tiny Tavistock Borough, Camden County, came in second with $22,297, followed by Millburn, where the average property taxpayer coughed up $19,989.

• The least expensive place to live in New Jersey was Walpack in Sussex County, where the average taxpayer paid about $514.

• Bergen, Morris and Union counties had the highest average property taxes in 2011. The average Bergen County taxpayer paid $10,317, a 2.6 percent jump from 2010. Morris County’s average bill was $9,644, while Union County overtook Essex for third place, at $9,493.

• The lowest county average was in Cumberland, where the average tax bill was about $3,419 in 2011, down 1 percent.

• Together, the three taxing authorities (towns, schools and counties) exceeded a 2 percent increase in collections in 312 towns, while 165 stayed within 2 percent and 89 saw the levy stay the same or decrease. In 2010, 529 towns saw an increase in their total tax levy, 425 of which went over 2 percent.

• Counties were more successful than towns and schools in keeping their tax levy below the cap.

State Leads Nation in Down-Payment Size

BUYERS in New Jersey have the highest down-payment rate in the country, putting down an average 13.71 percent of the purchase price, according to a new report from LendingTree. That surpasses percentages in cities like Washington, and states like New York, Hawaii and California, though only by tenths of a point. In New York, the average down payment works out to 13.47 percent. The national average is 12.24 percent, for the year ending in November.

Of course, very few borrowers pay the average percentage, which is computed by figuring out the average down payment on conventional loans made by banks and government-insured Federal Housing Administration or Department of Veterans Affairs loans, which have down payment minimums of 3.5 percent.

Countrywide, about a quarter of all mortgage loans are government-backed, according to lending specialists.

State market experts offered various nuanced reasons for New Jersey’s unenviable top position on the list compiled by LendingTree, which tries to match borrowers and favorable mortgage deals. Most boiled down to this: There is more higher-priced housing in New Jersey than in most other states. The bigger a mortgage loan is, the greater the percentage that lenders now require in down payment.
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Mortgage lenders have “definitely tightened loan requirements across the board in the last three years,” said Michael DiSalvio, the president of the Mortgage Bankers Association of New Jersey and an account manager for Genworth Financial. “We’ve learned our lesson.”

But he also said all of the roughly 75 banks belonging to the association offered some loans to qualified buyers of midpriced homes with just 5 percent down.

“We are stricter with credit scores for buyers,” he said. “Our limit is 660 to 670 from FICO, while the F.H.A. will take lower, maybe down to 640. We also have tightened the debt-to-income ratio; we keep it at 45 percent of buyers’ projected income, and F.H.A. will keep it at 55 percent. But 5 percent money is out there, it is widely available” among banks.
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Sounding the same note as LendingTree’s founder and chief executive, Douglas Lebda, who announced results of the down-payment study last month, Mr. DiSalvio opposed federal regulators’ idea for a 20 percent down payment on conventional loans carrying the lowest interest rates. He said such a move would “suffocate” the housing industry.
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“It would destroy us,” said Edward Walters Jr., the founding partner of the Walters Group, a development company that is building on 370 acres of the Pinelands region in southern New Jersey. (The Ocean Acres development where the Gallaghers bought their house is a part of it.)

Mr. Walters put it this way: “You don’t have to have a degree from Harvard to recognize that average people, making average salaries, paying normal utility and tax bills, figuring in the cost of food and gas, and considering loan interest rates of 5 or 6 percent, these people will not be able to afford a $350,000-to-$450,000 house — which is what about 80 percent of what our product is — if they have to come up with 20 percent down.”