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Where are you coming from? Parkton, Maryland (Originally from Portland, Oregon) Why are you moving? Job relocation
Where will you be working? If NYC, what part of NYC? Wife will be commuting to accounts in Hoboken, NJ / Long Island, NY / West Hartford CT / Danbury, CT. Her commute will be 1-2 times per week. I will be commuting to Harrisburg, PA once a week.
Will you buy or rent? Looking at both options – this is a 2-3 year relocation. What is your budget? $750k - $850k What kind of place are you looking for? House with at least 2000 square feet. 3br, 2 bath. Would like a small to medium sized yard (preferably fenced).
Will anyone (spouse, children, pets) be moving with you? Yes – spouse, 2 children (7yo & 5yo) and our golden retriever Do you need/want good public schools? Yes, good elementary schools. Middle school and high school are not important at this time.
Briefly describe the kind of neighborhood you'd like to live in. Would prefer a safe, family friendly neighborhood with a nice downtown area for shopping, dining, coffee shops, etc. Bonus points if there are golf courses nearby! Neither my wife and I will need to commute to NYC, however since we’re not from the east coast would like to take advantage of being near NYC for pro sporting events, entertainment and shows in the city (we’re big into comedy) and would love to be within a 30-60 minute train ride. We have family visit us from the west coast often and NYC will be a frequent visiting place. The proximity to NYC is not a big priority, but would be nice.
List three things that are important to you in order of importance. 1. Safety 2. Good elementary school 3. Family oriented 4. Downtown area 5. Semi convenient commute to NYC on occassion
From reading threads on this forum, I’ve focused a lot of my research on Summit and surrounding areas (Chatham, New Providence, Westfield, Maplewood, Livingston, Madison, etc.) We’ve prepared ourselves for the ridiculous property taxes. Ideally we’d prefer not to go over $15k / yr in property taxes, but will make exceptions for the right area. Renting is also an option since this is only a 2-3 year relocation, but would prefer to buy. We are targeting late June / early July for our move.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions, guidance you can provide! Happy to provide additional details if needed.
Thanks for the responses. We are leaning heavily toward buying due to the benefits provided for relocation (realtor fees are covered, closing costs mostly covered, etc). We are not ruling out renting, but feel we can meet more of our preferences with buying. Also looks like a lot of these areas are appreciating well in value. Will definitely keep an eye out for the right rental though too.
I’ll check out Edison. Any thoughts on Oradell or River Edge. It’s not as close to the city as we’d like to be but also considering Princeton area.
Should be able to get that for considerably under budget in West Orange, though taxes are high and the downtowns are in neighboring towns. That commute to Harrisburg is going to be rough no matter what though.
Pardon my language, but buying here for only a few years, with these property taxes is f’ing stupid. Plus we are very close to the top of the cyclical market. Do yourself a favor, save 50-100k and rent. You’ll also find yourself being much more smart about furniture purchases, custom curtains and rugs etc etc.
An 800k house may have 20k in property taxes. Your monthly nut could be 60/40 mortgage/tax escrow. Think about the breakeven costs of building equity and paying property tax (ie paying to borrow land) versus an all in payment to rent. In NJ, your housing costs are 2-3x skewed towards “renting” given the high property taxes of effectively 3% as opposed to 1-1.5% nationwide. Ie even owning a home debt free will still be 40% the cost of owning with a mortgage. Whereas the rest of the nation is 10-15%. Think about that for a second....So it takes a very long time of ownership to offset renting. After factoring in closing costs, and the usual, the breakeven cost to own versus renting is wayyy more than 3 years. Probably closer to 6 plus years. Factor higher furniture expenditures could and the housing stock is 50-100 yrs old with major repairs, and now you’re talking about easily a breakeven cost of maybe 10 plus years where owning makes more sense than renting. Seriously.
Thanks for the responses. We are leaning heavily toward buying due to the benefits provided for relocation (realtor fees are covered, closing costs mostly covered, etc). We are not ruling out renting, but feel we can meet more of our preferences with buying. Also looks like a lot of these areas are appreciating well in value. Will definitely keep an eye out for the right rental though too.
I’ll check out Edison. Any thoughts on Oradell or River Edge. It’s not as close to the city as we’d like to be but also considering Princeton area.
For your budget in the towns you mentioned, buying an older house will keep the property tax relatively low. However, you'll probably spend $$$ if you wish to update. If you buy new/newer, then you'll looking at a property tax way above $15k. If you'll stick around just for 2-3 years, just rent.
For your wife's commute, it will be better to live north of the GWB because there is less traffic on the Palisades in the morning and it puts you closer to Ct (TPZ bridge). That location will put you further away for Harrisburg though. Those towns may be a little less expensive because most are not train towns. Look in the Northern Valley where there are lots of little towns. Towns closer to Hudson River would provide for faster access to the Palisades parkway. Tenafly, Cresskill, demarest, closter, norwood.
Oradell and Riveredge are nice but they mean you'll be using RT 17 or GSP which are not great roads during rush hour. Even Haworth is 10 minutes closer to the Palisades.
For your wife's commute, it will be better to live north of the GWB because there is less traffic on the Palisades in the morning and it puts you closer to Ct (TPZ bridge). That location will put you further away for Harrisburg though. Those towns may be a little less expensive because most are not train towns. Look in the Northern Valley where there are lots of little towns. Towns closer to Hudson River would provide for faster access to the Palisades parkway. Tenafly, Cresskill, demarest, closter, norwood.
Oradell and Riveredge are nice but they mean you'll be using RT 17 or GSP which are not great roads during rush hour. Even Haworth is 10 minutes closer to the Palisades.
Awesome, thanks for the tip!! Will definitely take this into consideration.
Regarding the rent vs. buy dilemma. I would prefer to rent if we could find what we're looking for in a house rental. We have a dog and many of the rentals are not pet friendly and the ones that are don't have fenced yards. Trust me, I'm going to keep looking!
Financially the break even point (rent vs. buy) appears to be right around the 1yr 9mo - 2 year mark. I've used several rent vs. buy calculators and updating the variables for our situation. Most rentals we'd even consider are around $4k per month. If we buy, we'd put 20% down, factoring in $15-$20k per month for property taxes and 2.5% closing costs / no realtor fees on buying end (we won't pay more than that due to company's relocation incentives) and 0% closing costs / no realtor fees on the selling end (another company perk). I'm factoring in monthly home maintenance as well.
I'd love not to go through the hassle of buying, but not really finding any great rentals. I've been using Zillow and Realtor.com primarily. Any other suggestions for finding home rentals?
Thanks for all the replies. You've all been a great help!
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