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We moved into our new modest home in Livingston this past Sunday. For those interested in moving into town, I thought I would start providing periodic updates. Please keep in mind this is purely from my own personal experience.
Before we moved in, we had an opportunity to repaint the entire interior of the house. During those few days, we had already met a few of our neighbors. This was possible especially because our house is situated in a quiet neighborhood, where many of the residents are seen walking dogs or going out for strolls themselves. Every single one of them expressed how happy they are in town, while they have also raved about the public education system. Most of them have told us that they moved specifically for the education. The programs offered for kids are definitely plentiful.
We live in the “Riker Hill” section of town, and you really get a sense of that when you look at your next door neighbors from the backyard, where you see a nice line of homes built uphill and another set of homes built downhill, though the hill is by no means steep.
We’ve met both of our next door neighbors. They are older and friendly. One of them bought the house back in 1956 from a gentleman who would eventually become the President and CEO of PSE&G. There is one particular family diagonally across the street with three young boys, who have embraced us. Thankfully for our 5-year old, they have a swing set in their backyard, and she is getting to ride shotgun in their miniature battery powered truck.
We happen to live in an area where there appears to be quite a few younger families, which we hope is a good thing.
We’re still living out of our boxes for the most part, but definitely making progress. This weekend, we plan to go furniture shopping for our living room, dining room and patio.
Being that it’s a house built in 1952, we’ve seen a couple of issues. First, it’s colder than we were used to. This will take some getting used to (utility bills…yikes!). Second, my wife found a couple of gas leaks, which, accordingly to the gas company, are not life threatening and probably have been there for a while. We’re still bummed that the home inspector didn’t catch it.
So far, we’ve enjoyed the sometime-chaotic move to our new hometown.
To be continued...
Last edited by stradivarius; 05-15-2013 at 02:10 PM..
Reason: Fixed formatting issues
If you don't like that it's colder than you are used to, i used a company for a home energy audit and they did some air sealing and insulation work. i'd highly recommend them. message me if you are every interested.
Thanks so much for your insights! Please keep updating with the house issues.. I am looking for a new house in Edison/North Brunswick/Livingston and it really comes down to family atmosphere!
If you don't like that it's colder than you are used to, i used a company for a home energy audit and they did some air sealing and insulation work. i'd highly recommend them. message me if you are every interested.
Thanks so much for your insights! Please keep updating with the house issues.. I am looking for a new house in Edison/North Brunswick/Livingston and it really comes down to family atmosphere!
I definitely will. Good luck with wherever you end up!
We moved into our new modest home in Livingston this past Sunday. For those interested in moving into town, I thought I would start providing periodic updates. Please keep in mind this is purely from my own personal experience.
Before we moved in, we had an opportunity to repaint the entire interior of the house. During those few days, we had already met a few of our neighbors. This was possible especially because our house is situated in a quiet neighborhood, where many of the residents are seen walking dogs or going out for strolls themselves. Every single one of them expressed how happy they are in town, while they have also raved about the public education system. Most of them have told us that they moved specifically for the education. The programs offered for kids are definitely plentiful.
We live in the “Riker Hill” section of town, and you really get a sense of that when you look at your next door neighbors from the backyard, where you see a nice line of homes built uphill and another set of homes built downhill, though the hill is by no means steep.
We’ve met both of our next door neighbors. They are older and friendly. One of them bought the house back in 1956 from a gentleman who would eventually become the President and CEO of PSE&G. There is one particular family diagonally across the street with three young boys, who have embraced us. Thankfully for our 5-year old, they have a swing set in their backyard, and she is getting to ride shotgun in their miniature battery powered truck.
We happen to live in an area where there appears to be quite a few younger families, which we hope is a good thing.
We’re still living out of our boxes for the most part, but definitely making progress. This weekend, we plan to go furniture shopping for our living room, dining room and patio.
Being that it’s a house built in 1952, we’ve seen a couple of issues. First, it’s colder than we were used to. This will take some getting used to (utility bills…yikes!). Second, my wife found a couple of gas leaks, which, accordingly to the gas company, are not life threatening and probably have been there for a while. We’re still bummed that the home inspector didn’t catch it.
So far, we’ve enjoyed the sometime-chaotic move to our new hometown.
To be continued...
Riker Hill Art Park? That's an intriguing place. A former Nike missile base turned into inexpensive places for artists to create art. Bet that it wouldn't happen nowadays.
Riker Hill Art Park? That's an intriguing place. A former Nike missile base turned into inexpensive places for artists to create art. Bet that it wouldn't happen nowadays.
Yeah what a wild concept, right? We have yet to check it out. There's supposed to be an artists' open house in a couple of weeks, which I'd like to attend.
I’d say that since we moved in last Sunday, we’re about 90% unpacked, and all of us are getting the hang of this more suburban life. (We lived in Fort Lee, NJ for 9 years before this.)
Yesterday, we drove to Fairfield, NJ, which is about 12 miles north of Livingston, for some furniture shopping. It took us about 25 minutes to get there through local Saturday morning traffic. Maybe there was a more direct, uninterrupted highway route. Not sure. Anyway, once we got to the stores, we knew what we were looking for, and had to visit just two stores before we were able to decide on the specific items we wanted.
On our way back, we headed to East Hanover, which is just one town west of Livingston, to look at swing sets for our kids, since we thought it’s kinda on our way home. (We actually started our house search in East Hanover, which is in Morris County, because of relatively low taxes, but ended up in Livingston, which is in Essex County. We thought that the quality of education our kids would be exposed to would be worth the difference in taxes. Not that East Hanover has a bad education system. Far from it, actually.) We decided that instead of one of those build-yourself type sets you get from Lowe’s or Toys R Us, we would be more comfortable getting one through a regional shop that assembles and warranties their work for 30 days after installation. Of course, there is a separate limited warranty for the product itself. Mission accomplished after we visited two outdoor showrooms. Delivery and installation scheduled for June 1.
Getting home: East Hanover has lots of stores and businesses, from a Home Depot to a Dick’s Sporting Goods to an Applebee’s to a bowling alley, all along Route 10. What should have taken us 7 minutes to get home ended up taking us double that time because of that shopping traffic. I suppose that we were just as guilty as anyone else for being part of that traffic. Once we made it into Livingston, the traffic eased up.
On a completely separate note, I continue to be impressed with the town offerings for children. Our neighbors forwarded us the link below, which provides all the details regarding the town’s spring and summer youth programs:
The Riker Hill section of Livingston has a lot of interesting stuff going on.
Riker Hill Art Park also offers classes, I think, and art-themed children's birthday parties. It's a quiet, peaceful park high up on a hill. In July, that's where a lot of people go to watch the sky for fireworks, and in the winter, it's a good place to go sledding. It also connects to a trail that will lead you out to the Lenape Trail out to the old Becker Farm site, and to Walter Kidde Dinosaur Park. "Dinosaur Park" sounds exciting because it sounds like there'll be a giant T rex skeleton like in the Museum of Natural History, but really, it's just a quiet place with trails and a nice place to walk around. But it is a national fossil site, or something, where actual dinosaur fossils were found.
The other interesting curiosity in the Riker Hill section is the Boiardo Mansion on Beauford Ave., not far from Riker Hill Art Park. It belonged to famous Prohibition-era mafioso Rugierro (aka Richard) Boiardo, aka "Richie The Boot". The gated entrance to the estate is on Beauford Ave. (You can't see the mansion from the street, so here are a few pics from a feature that LIFE magazine did in the late 60s/early 70s). The Boiardo estate has a colorful history with some urban legend attached. Rumor has it that peacocks once roamed the property which also had a guest house, pool, drive-in movie theater, statues, a network of underground tunnels, and a crematorium on the premises (where Richie The Boot would dispose of his enemies, but that part's probably definitely urban legend). The story that gets printed a lot about this place is that one day a mom driving a station wagon full of cub scouts drove up to the gate thinking it was the entrance to Riker Hill Park and was told threateningly by the armed guards at the gate to leave. The estate is now owned by a Dr. Boiardo (some kind of famous knee surgeon, or something) who has nothing to do with the original crime family.
The Riker Hill section is also where Chelsea Handler grew up. Handler graduated from Livingston High School in 1993, and according to the Livingston Public Schools' Facebook page, she is planning to return to LHS this fall to film Chelsea Lately. By the way, Jason Alexander ('George Costanza' on Seinfeld) is also an LHS graduate and went back to LHS in the '90s to speak to the students.
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