Looking to buy a house in NJ (lived earlier in Jersey City - newport area) (Garfield: foreclosures)

[newptlguest]

Hello All,

I have been reading forums here since couple of days only but I am very much impressed by the response/feedback people give here.

Me & my wife are living in newport are (jersey city). We both work in midtown manhattan, NY. We are planning to buy a townhouse in NJ.. some of the criteria we are looking ..
1) Easy commute (don't want to change too many buses/trains)
2) Safe neighbourhood
3) Townhouse with attached garage is preferred. Condos will be 2nd choice if i can't find anything.
4) Resale value (area, school district wise)
5) Budget 350-400K...

We like recently constructed townhouses but its not must. I am open to area, as long as we can commute to NYC.

I have heard "not so great" reviews about Garfield, NJ area as well as some about society hill/droyers point in jersey city, NJ.
We have looked houses there and actually we love the townhouses, but not sure wether we should buy it or not.

Riverside court in secaucus seems ideal but its bit expensive. We are planning to start a family as well so not sure whether we should invest too much on house or not.

Areas like Fair lawn, saddle brook, rutherford gets high votes, but they don't have that many townhomes i think (or atleast not built after 1995-2000? newer).

Any help would be appreciated.

[SonorityGenius]

buy a nice single family home in the JC Heights instead

[newptlguest]

Thanks, but jersey city heights is one of those areas i am not interested in. I have lived in JSQ area for 2 years and not fan of JC Heights. I don't mind even going to edison (central/southern NJ) but they are far and commute is expensive, i would rather spend that money on mortgage

[Seduflow]

the only time it makes sense to own is if you plan on living there for at least 5 years. if you are planning on starting a family soon then it would make sense to pick a town that offers full day preschool for free (NJ law does not require schools to have it, so it depends from town to town).

[newptlguest]

Hm, didn't know that. Yes i am planning to stay there for atleast 5 years for sure. So does it mean, i should look for towns with better schools ?

I am not sure about secaucus, jersey city schooling, can someone please advise.

I am open to buy single family home as well but again i was just worried about resale/maintenance of it. But that is also an option.

What are the towns i should be focusing on ?

Thank you.

[bay]

We have similar situation before. We lived in Newport for 2 years before we bought in society hill. We lived in society hill for 4 years and raised our son there before he reaches school age. Then We bought a single family in Berkeley Heights at the end of 2009 and my son is currently in Kindergarten at BH school. If you just think about starting a family, society hill is not a bad starting place. The community itself is nice and isolated. Little kids can play safely in the community. Additionally, even the reasle value for condo/townhouse may not be good, the rental price is pretty good in society hill. We bought our condo at 268K in 2005 and now we rent it out for 1750 per month which can cover the mortgage, tax and maintenance. However, since the housing market is low, you may want to take advantage to move up directly to single family even though you don't have kid now.

[lfsr1544]

Originally Posted by Seduflow

the only time it makes sense to own is if you plan on living there for at least 5 years. if you are planning on starting a family soon then it would make sense to pick a town that offers full day preschool for free (NJ law does not require schools to have it, so it depends from town to town).

most school districts that offer free full day pre-k are in Abbott school districts where there is a strong need to get many of these kids into a positive environment as early as possible. However, these areas also come with serious quality of life issues such as crime, foreclosures, etc