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Hi,
We are a young couple (soon-to-be-parents) looking to move to Bergen County. We are looking for a decent size Colonial home (2500 sqft+) in a good neighborhood where there are good schools, parks, restaurants etc.
We both work in NYC (midtown/downtown) and hence commute is an important factor too.
Our budget is around 750K with taxes around 15K max. We looked at Ridgewood, Glen Rock, Paramus, River Edge, Oradell. Can you help me compare these towns and which is our best bet? We found homes in River Edge are much newer compared to Ridgewood, Glen Rock but not sure how good the town is. Paramus has good homes with lower taxes but not sure if it has the community feeling.
Any information you provide will be very helpful in deciding.
All towns have buses and Ridgewood, Glen Rock, River Edge and Oradell have trains (transfer required for direct Midtown service, or take PATH from Hoboken.) Paramus has lower taxes due to massive commercial tax income, but with that you're living in a town that has 3 malls in it. Ridgewood has a nice big downtown with shops, restaurants and bars. Other towns have smaller downtowns, with Paramus kinda just being houses, malls and bottleneck traffic on 4 and 17. Commute to Manhattan won't be glamorous in any location, but you likely won't want to rip your face off and jump into a pit of wolverines. Or you might, commuting sucks.
That's a great budget though so you shouldn't have much issue finding a nice home in good shape in any of those towns or others.
You really can't go wrong with any of those towns. Personally, I would put Ridgewood and Glen Rock at the top of the list.
The difficult part will be finding homes in that price range with taxes around $15k. In Paramus, it can certainly be found. Ridgewood has a few available.
River Edge and Glen Rock, expect to pay close to $20k in taxes in that price range.
Might be able to find a house here or there in Oradell in the price range and taxes.
Thanks for the info. I was looking at a home in River Edge. However, I heard the water table is high in River Edge and this could cause problems in the basement. The home is highly priced so I am not sure that Water issue is factored into the price..
2500 Sq Ft. for $750K in Ridgewood and Glen Rock are going to be in pretty short supply(unless you are counting finished basements as square footage)! Ridgewood has bigger homes but they are more in the $800K-$1.5MM plus range. A quick search only found 2 on the Market at 2500 sq. ft.+ for under $800K. Glen Rock had 5 but 2 were on super busy roads, in general Glen Rock homes are smaller mostly old colonials and less stately than Ridgewood. While Glen Rock has come up in the last 20 years Ridgewood has always been where the money is hence the larger stock of bigger homes.
River Edge is a great town. Be wary of the "colonial" homes in River Edge that were built from 2005 - 2013. They might look impressive but most of them were built to turn a profit and were built quickly with cheap materials. Many of them that were built in the early part of the millennium are pieces of garbage and are already falling apart (roof coming off, siding coming off, water issues, etc). The basements on these things are typically the original 3 bedroom 1940s ranch homes that once sat there. Most of the ranches in that area have water issues in their basements. The monstrosity homes that took their place are no different. Look at the street names: Valley Road, Lakeview Road, Reservoir Ave, Eastbrook Ct, etc etc etc that should tell you something as to the history of that area right away.
River Edge is a great town, and the area of the town I am describing is great too. Just as long as you have a sump pump or two, and a gas generator, and don't mind bailing out water during a hurricane. Some of the ranch homes during a hurricane had water up to the 1st floors.
If you plan on having a finished basement or anything of value in your basement, even without any previous water issues or if it's a new development, get the sump pump install. Other things will leak (water heater, pipes, etc)
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