Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
What is your budget ? willing to spend 5-850k for a home. (varies due to some rental property we have here, that we may sell-or not)
...
we currently live in a neighborhood where lots are 1+ or more acres, homes are 3200 sq ft or more. There is a neighborhood pool & tennis club. You do not have to belong to the tennis/swim club if you live in the neighborhood, so we have much diversity in family types (young, mid-age w/older kids, empty nesters, etc.) We have been very happy here with this type of community.
1+ acres? and 3200 sq ft?
You are going to be closer to or over your $850K limit.
And if you do find such a house. You are looking at long commute from western, northwestern, or southern NJ.
Hi,
So my family may be moving from Raleigh to NJ. Job is in Avenel. Where would be a good place to live/raise our family (we have a 5th grader & a 3rd grader). We have heard that Colt's Neck is a nice place & have started looking there. Any other suggestions?
Are taxes & prices much higher than in the SE? We've seen real estate in NJ hit a high a few years ago, bottom out, and it appears to be rebounding.
We've looked at weather - seems Raleigh runs about 10 degrees higher, on average, than Avenel area. What about snow? Do you get a lot?
Lastly, are they welcoming to people from the South? Raleigh has gotten very diverse in the past 10 years (we have been here since graduating from NCSU in '90). We are catholic, are there any good catholic elementary schools in the area? Are they hard to get into?
Thanks!
I am a former NJ resident of 65 years retired to the Sandhills of NC.
You are going to get sticker shock when it comes to RE prices and RE taxes.
The reason RE prices in NJ are so high is because of land costs not building costs.
You can buy a nice newer home in NC for 250-400k depending on location.
In NJ you will not be able to find a nice house for 300k in Central NJ where Avenel is. You may find a fixer upper on a small lot for that amount.
Here is my example
We sold a 40 YO house on 1.5 acre in Somerset Co. that was in great condition but needed a kitchen upgrade for 600k. Taxes were 12k the schools in that town were highly rated.
Regarding schools, NJ is in the top across the US and as you are well aware NC is near the bottom.
In NJ your children attend the schools in the town where you live. It is not county school systems like NC. Every town in NJ has it's own schools system over 600 school districts in a sate 1/6th the size of NC.
There are lots of Catholic schools in NJ but very few consider them equal in education standards compared to public.
The good part about NJ is that if you have the right job you make a lot more money than people doing the same job in NC.
Commuting times in NJ takes a lot longer than they do in NC. I have seen the traffic around Raleigh and it is laughable compared to NJ traffic.
I am not trying to discourage you because NJ is a great place to educate you kids, make good money and avail yourself of NYC entertainment but is can be expensive.
Yes it snows a lot more in NJ than it does in NC.
People in NJ can seem to be rude because they don't sugar coat anything. They will tell you the truth(except for car salesmen). You will never hear anybody in NJ say."Bless your heart"
If you are set on Catholic schools and have no intention on public education, and want a large living space with a few acres, you might want to look at parts of Franklin Township in Somerset County. Granted this town has some bad areas, but most of it is beautiful. You can look at Franklin Park or Griggstown (Princeton zip code) for the space that may accommodate you.
You asked about why people on this forum feel that catholic schools are not as good as the public schools, and are looking for statistics and facts to back their opinions. I did a little bit of searching and did come up with some good info.
There is a wonderful website that lists NJ high schools test scores here, Interactive Map: High School SAT scores - NJ Spotlight (the site is also very useful for help finding which towns have well performing schools). Do not go only by SAT scores, but also check out the % of students taking AP classes as well as the percentage that score higher than 3 on the tests. Also note the scores from the HSPA exams as well as how many of the schools graduates did not pass HSPA. The site also provides the % of kids who are not proficient in language arts and math. The Bio test is new for the state and is given soon after student take their first bio course. In some districts that is after completing middle school, and others after 9th grade. I do want to mention that not all catholic schools report their scores to the state Dept of Ed., so you will not see every catholic HS in the state on that map. I did some searching around for the average SAT and HSPA scores for all the Catholic HS's in the state. Sadly, not all of them list their scores anywhere on the web. I did find many though. The majority of catholic HS's that do publish this info have average scores below the statewide average of 1550. Several simply indicate that they score at/near statewide average, and a some say their ave SAT scores were above the statewide average. I could not find one catholic school that had average SAT scores above 1700. The catholic HS with the highest ave I could find was St. Peters Prep in Jersey City, which is a boys only Jesuit school located in Jersey City with an average of 1661. It is my understanding that that school is very selective on who they accept, much like a magnet school, so they only take the cream of the crop of applicants. Being that public schools in the local area are terrible with the one exception of a magnet school in JC, they get many more applicants then they have slots for. I also noted that all of the catholic HS's offered less in AP courses, as well as honors courses. I also found a similar situation when looking at other statewide exams in lower grades. Although I would not call my research definitive, as I could not get stats for every catholic school, IMHO, I believe the general perception most in NJ have that catholic schools do not perform as well as public schools is well founded. That being said, you will find that in some towns the catholic schools are better than the public schools, mostly in the school districts that are quite underfunctioning, such as Camden, Newark, etc. I'd include links for all the sites I used, but it would be quite long and unwieldly. Also as others have noted here in NJ, we have the highest property tax rates in the nation, and the majority of those taxes go to the school tax component of the property taxes. If you are already paying so much for the schools in the town, laying down a further $10,000+ per child per year for private school is hard to justify unless as I mentioned earlier you happen to live in a town that has a school district that is severely underfunctioning. I should also mention that there are magnet schools in Monmouth and Middlesex Counties, and they only take the cream of the crop, so they all show high SAT scores. Usually you can tell if it is a magnet school by its name (not being the name of the town where it's located).
Another poster recommended looking in Franklin in Somerset Co, I really would not recommend moving there. Yes there are some nice neighborhoods, but they are surrounded by not very nice neighborhoods rife with gangs, drugs, and crime (which does not stop at neighborhood borders). In addition, your commute from Franklin Park would likely be in the 45min to 1 hr range, depending on precisely when you travel. Griggstown will be a longer commute. Traveling Rte 1, the most direct route from the Franklin area to Avenel during rush is a royal PITA. Actually traveling anywhere via Rte 1 is a PITA during rush hour.
As others have mentioned, to find a home that meets your desires regarding sq footage and lot size, you will have to give some on your commute time.
As for Colts Neck, yes it is a wonderful, safe, bucolic town, and the schools are good. The downside is the homes that are available there. There are plenty on the market for under 850k, but very few will have the sq. footage or land you are seeking. There seems to be a big split in homes in CN, those around 500k and below are mostly older homes, built before 1970, and have far less sq footage and the amenities you'd be seeking. For homes similar to what you have now, you are talking just under 1M and up. (hi 900k's +) I did find a few, I think 3 or 4, but they have been on the market for a long time, 90+ days. It has been my experience that if a home has been on the market that long in NJ, there is usually a problem with it. Be careful as some homes listed as CN are really in neighboring towns, but have a CN mailing address, which some see as a status thing. In those homes that are in neighboring towns, but have CN mailing addresses the kids must go to school in the town the are actually in not to the CN schools, unless they are willing to pay tuition, and the CN schools are willing to admit them (not all towns will do this). At least one of the three or four I mentioned above have a CN mailing address, but is actually located in a neighboring town). I also have heard from my friend that there is a definite "the haves, and have nots" schism in the town of CN. which has gotten worse now that quite a number of people have built mansions in the area (a lot of pro athletes, actors, and musicians. Bruce Springsteen & his wife Patti Scialfa, Queen Latifa, Joe Klecko, Jim Nance, Wayne Chrebet, amongst them).
I think you would be much better off expanding your search to a few other towns since the number of homes in your price range that fit your desires is so small. I recommend looking at Holmdel. It's a wonderful town with a reasonable commute time to Avenel, and plenty of homes in your price range that fit your desired sq footage and lot size. The town is safe, and has very well regarded schools. Being closer to Avenel means you'll also have a shorter commute than Colts Neck. Holmdel Twp is fairly large, and does have a reputation as being a great place to raise kids. IIRC, there is no real centralized downtown, but the PNC Arts Center, which is a venue that gets plenty of top tier events and concerts is located in Holmdel. Thankfully, since there is a dedicated exit and entrance off the parkway that almost all, if not all traffic, use to gain entrance to the venue, the town does not get overrun with traffic during the events. Holmdel also has greater diversity, ethnically, religiously, economically, and culturally than you'll find in CN.
Rumson is a great safe town with great schools, but you'll have to compromise on the acreage to keep within your budget. It's a nice friendly close knit town great for raising kids in. There are plenty of well kept updated older stately homes in the town.
To find a home close to your stated preferences to the west of Avenel, you're looking at Watchung or Warren, and a commute of ~1hr or so. The towns closer to Avenel all have smaller homes on smaller lots than you are seeking. If you are willing to accept a little bit smaller house on a half acre you'll find more options - the trade off will be less in commute time.
You may also find you have to adjust your housing budget due to the higher property taxes in NJ.
Wow, thank you to all of you who posted answers to the questions I asked, and for the input on location & acreage/sq footage of home desired. KoalaNJ, HUGE thank you - I tend to be 'data driven', sometimes to the nth degree (and helps when we are comparing areas). Having stats, & knowing what they mean can really help us make a decision. We will be looking at that great SAT map when combing through communities for our family.
I have also been speaking to friends & co-workers who hail from the NE, especially my NJ friends. Without even saying I was going to look into Catholic school, they said "and you don't need Catholic school, b/c the school system is so good".....and went on to back up claims made here. This is definitely a shift for our family.
In a nutshell....Commute - can be long - especially in summer months if around Colt's Neck area. Double (or more) time on Googlemaps/Mapquest/etc.
(Couple of specific cities we have questions about here....):
Cities/areas to consider - I had a private message from someone who gave me a handful of communities to look at - Marlboro, Manalapan, Holmdel and Colts Neck. From here - Ramsun, Holmdel, Watchung, Warren. From many friends who are now living in NC an used to live in NJ, I hear similar cities mentioned, along w/Princeton area, as noted here. Is that a good consideration? Also, Metuchen. Any opinions there?
Land/Housing - high taxes (btw, found the following site that enables me to input prospective homes & find their property tax bill): NJ Assessment Records Search
Very high, as stated earlier.
We may be looking at reducing size & acreage, which is ok, if offset by good schools and a safe neighborhood.
We have a lot to consider, and to think about. You all have helped - Thank you.
Look in Somerset county for the size of home and lot you want along with excellent schools. Fairly easy commute to Avenel because of no shore traffic.
Take a look at a map and see where all these towns are located in relation to the interstates. Easy access to everthing in NJ. There are many good reasons while Somerset Co is in the top ten in wealth nationwide.
Branchburg
Bridgewater
Warren
Far Hills
Bedminster
Pea Pack Gladstone
Bernardsville
Stay away from,
Bound Brook
Manville
Franklin Twp (because of schools)
Hillsborough (poor access to highways)
Wow, thank you to all of you who posted answers to the questions I asked, and for the input on location & acreage/sq footage of home desired. KoalaNJ, HUGE thank you - I tend to be 'data driven', sometimes to the nth degree (and helps when we are comparing areas). Having stats, & knowing what they mean can really help us make a decision. We will be looking at that great SAT map when combing through communities for our family.
I have also been speaking to friends & co-workers who hail from the NE, especially my NJ friends. Without even saying I was going to look into Catholic school, they said "and you don't need Catholic school, b/c the school system is so good".....and went on to back up claims made here. This is definitely a shift for our family.
In a nutshell....Commute - can be long - especially in summer months if around Colt's Neck area. Double (or more) time on Googlemaps/Mapquest/etc.
(Couple of specific cities we have questions about here....):
Cities/areas to consider - I had a private message from someone who gave me a handful of communities to look at - Marlboro, Manalapan, Holmdel and Colts Neck. From here - Ramsun, Holmdel, Watchung, Warren. From many friends who are now living in NC an used to live in NJ, I hear similar cities mentioned, along w/Princeton area, as noted here. Is that a good consideration? Also, Metuchen. Any opinions there?
Land/Housing - high taxes (btw, found the following site that enables me to input prospective homes & find their property tax bill): NJ Assessment Records Search
Very high, as stated earlier.
We may be looking at reducing size & acreage, which is ok, if offset by good schools and a safe neighborhood.
We have a lot to consider, and to think about. You all have helped - Thank you.
Irish,
The better areas of NJ are a great place to raise a family. Of course, the better areas are also the most expensive. Some of the towns mentioned above, such as Rumson, Colts Neck and Westfield will get you a good school district, but an mid-entry level home. Your $800,000 isn't going to go nearly as far in NJ as it would in the Triangle. Also, expect taxes on that level of home to be above $12000, at a minimum.
Lastly, NC schools get a bad rap, but if you are in Chapel Hill or one of the better Wake County nodes, you will find that scores on standardized tests to be every bit as good as the best NJ towns. What will be lacking in many of NJ best towns is diversity, which may, or may not be important to you.
Good luck!
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
