Suburb w/ 1,5 hour commute to Wall Street (Englewood, Paramus: apartment, renting)

[Wangcincay]

My husband would be working on the Wall Street we are thinking of buying a house. We are considering the possibility areas within NJ, Westchester, or Connecticut with the following criteria:

1. Friendly and close knit suburban area with preferably good diversity and lower population
2. Maximum 1.5 hour door to door commute, private or public transportation is equally okay.
3. Budget of about $500.000 for a 1800 sqft house
4. Walkable, available sidewalk with good care (including clean streets and well cared public facilities)
5. Quiet neighborhood with little night life. As long as there’s a grocery store, decent school, a park, a small mall perhaps, all is well
6. Hilly region with forest or lake

I really want to emphasis on a suburban lifestyle with natural vista. Hence why I’m not choosing an apartment in NYC which would probably be a more convenient choice. I enjoy taking walks, socializing with neighbors, and i want a neighborhood that really has that spirit.

NJ has quite a number of reserves and i suspect there might be one or two neighborhood near those beautiful reserves that fits my criteria.

I had considered several places and i’m drawn to Englewood, but i’m not sure as I have never lived there so it’s purely google search. Please share your thoughts on what would be a suitable area.

[foodyum]

Englewood is an option except for the good schools part. Palisades interstate and flat rock brook are both wonderful parks although they are not in walking distance to the the neighborhoods that would be your targets.

[blahblahyoutoo]

I'm mostly familiar with Bergen country and it's going to be hard to find a home for $500k that meets your criteria that isn't a fixer upper by my standards (really depends on your tolerance level for the condition of the home). Bergen has malls everywhere within a 15 minute drive tops, mostly clustered around Paramus. Tons of strip malls everywhere else, so this requirement shouldn't be an issue.
Englewood is fine, except that are nicer parts and not so nice parts. It's close enough to overpeck which is a nice park with a pond, not really a lake.

I will say that for a commute to wall st, your best bet is PATH from JC to WTC and then walk, or the ferry from Weehawken that pretty much drops you off on Wall St. Both would be about 20-30 minutes NJ to Wall St, so factor that in as the additional commute time from your house to JC/Weekhawken.

[Retriever]

My immediate reaction is that Englewood will not come even close to fulfilling your desire for a "hilly region with forest or lake". One of the things that surprises most people who move to NJ from other parts of the country (or from other parts of the world, like you) is the length of commuting time to NYC. What you want is possible, but you will likely to looking at the extreme upper end of that 1.5 hour commuting time if you want a town with a forest or lake.

Rather than suburban, your desires sound more like you are looking for a home in a rural area that is fairly far from NYC, and that may result in limited access to public transit, thus putting your husband in the car for a very grueling commute to work.

Regarding commuting by car, are you aware of the tolls that are charged for driving into NYC?
Are you aware of the cost of parking a car in NYC?

[foodyum]

"I really want to emphasis on a suburban lifestyle with natural vista. Hence why I’m not choosing an apartment in NYC which would probably be a more convenient choice. I enjoy taking walks, socializing with neighbors, and i want a neighborhood that really has that spirit."

Are you aware that with a half million dollar budget you will only be able to afford a tiny one bedroom or studio in a nice neighborhood close to wall street?

Maybe look up in Inwood. You could take the (cheap) subway to work, there are beautiful parks, very diverse.

[vision33r]

This is a bad time to buy, go renting is so much cheaper right now.

[cw30000]

I don’t think you will find anything with your budget.

Getting off the path and walk to Wall St is like 15 to 20 minutes.

[kosb]

You have to try towards Western Morris (NJ Transit Morris Essex or Gladstone-Peapeck line) or Western Somerset county or may be Eastern part of Hunterdon adjoining 78. I can easily find houses, townhome for this kind of budget in Bridgewater, Basking Ridge, Montville, Randolph, Morris Plains, Morristown, Denville. If you come further west to Mendham, Chester, Mount Olive, Long Valley, Clinton, Sommerville, White House you can stretch your dollar more. All these areas are near mountain, lot of hiking trails, lakes.
You can checkout some instagram tags like #northjerseyadventures, #morriscountynj
Some page you can checkout to get a feel of the area (of course it looks more pretty with instagram filters, but definitely can give you more idea) https://www.instagram.com/ilovelongvalley/ https://www.instagram.com/ilovechesternj_official/

[Coney]

Your budget is much too low for anything that close to Wall Street.

[NY Annie]

Look at south shore of Staten Island. Ferry is best option for a shorter trip - it's only a few stops on the train.