The Bergen County Homes Blog

Whether you’re talking about Bergen County New Jersey or anywhere else in the US, the housing market recovers at both extremes first and the rest of the real estate market comes along.  Now that we’re halfway through 2011, I thought it would be helpful to take a quick look at the numbers for Bergen County luxury homes and there’s no doubt that good things are happening.

In almost every location, the luxury home market has improved dramatically and this is especially true east of Route 17 which are closer to New York City.  While I’ve never seen any data to explain this, I have felt that being on top of the George Washington Bridge is a major factor for high end home buyers who are in positions where they may not stay for extended periods of time such as Fortune 500 CEO’s, senior level diplomats, celebrities and athletes and who must be within 15 minutes of the George Washington Bridge.

Let’s take a look at our luxury home market in Bergen County beginning with Alpine New Jersey.   Alpine made tremendous progress in 2011.  Alpine homes nearly tripled the number of sales in 2011 going from 4 to 11.  Smart home buyers looked at Alpine homes as a tremendous opportunity.  I remember one buyer saying to me that he never thought he could buy a good home in Alpine at $2-2.5 million.

Saddle River  had a solid performance this year with one more sale going from 19 to 20 closings.  Saddle River homes certainly appear to have stabilized and the average sales price of a Saddle River home is up by 10%.  Alpine and Saddle River are the 2 most exclusive Bergen County luxury home markets.

Franklin Lakes is still having a tough time though; Franklin Lakes homes went from 50 to 38 sales and average pricing is down by 3% but there’s good news here too for Franklin Lakes homes – home buyers paid a higher percentage of the asking price in 2011 and the time it took to sell a Franklin Lakes home dropped dramatically from 126 to 92 days.  I bet you’ll see a great improvement in Franklin Lakes homes by year’s end and certainly in 2012.

Tenafly homes at the luxury home level more than tripled the number of sales going from 2 to 7.  While the average sales price was lower, this does not tell the reality of the Tenafly luxury home market.  The 2 sales in 2010 were new construction; the 7 sales in 2011 were from a broad palette of new and resale Tenafly homes.  Tenafly real estate at the high end did extremely well so far in 2011.

The bottom line on all of this is that the real estate market for Bergen County luxury homes is either stabilized or doing very well indeed and that’s good news for all of us.

Proximity to NYC,  great schools and a wonderful suburban lifestyle make buying a home in Bergen County, to quote Martha Stewart, a “good thing.”  Because Bergen County homes offer these advantages, buyers come here no matter the economy or housing market.  The Bergen County real estate market regularly outperforms all other counties in New Jersey and this is true today.

Taking a look at the market through May, we are significantly ahead of where we were last year.  In 2009 there were 2,011 sales and this year 2,536 for a gain of 525 units and a 26% improvement.  The average sales price decreased by 3% because more of the homes sold this year were less expensive than in 2009 but they sold quicker (5% fewer days on the market) and that’s positive.

These figures are from the New Jersey Multiple Listing Service and I have their graph here for you.

When June numbers are in, I expect this trend to continue.  The question is how much of this is due to the tax credit and to the demanding terms of jumbo loans.  With formidable down payment requirements, the jumbo loan has really put a damper on the market for more expensive houses along with the negative economy.  Very recently these demands have been relaxed and so we’ve seen a real pick up in such places as Englewood Cliffs, Franklin Lakes, Saddle River and Tenafly.   Based on both the NJMLS data and the activity we’re seeing in all of our offices, there is a significant improvement in the demand for Bergen County real estate so far this year.  I’ll continue to keep you updated throughout the year.