I believe sprinkler systems and fire escapes are only required for 3-families or more--not 2-families. Is your house a 2-family?
For a room to be a legal bedroom it must have a window large enough for a person to fit through in case of a fire or emergency.

If you don't mind losing 4 inches from that wall you can--and should--if the noise is that bad--frame another wall with 2 x 4's right on top of your existing wall. Stuff the cavities between the 2 x 4s with ROXUL mineral wool insulation. This is a Canadian product used for both soundproofing and fireproofing. It is not available at Home Depot or Lowes but you can get it at "Allied Builing Supplies." (and no, I don't work for them). This makes a HUGE difference in the soundproofing. It is worth the effort. Double drywall the new studs with 5/8 inch sheetrock--not 1/2 inch. The contractor will say that's for ceilings and it is but you can use on walls and you need the extra thickness. Squirt green liberally between these 2 layers of sheetrock in a silly string pattern. Within 30 days, it will cure and act as a sound dampener. Acoustical caulk is important around any hole or outlet.

"There's" not "theirs." I know better than that.

And just a couple of doors down from Central Liquor, in that beautiful old firehouse across from Pershing Field, is ....drumroll please, the headquarters of the DIY TV show "COUSINS ON CALL." It's on HGTV. They used to have a show called "Kitchen Cousins" which splashed Hoboken signs all over the place in the opening credits/intro section. It used to bug me to see them so blatantly lie about their location in an obvious attempt to hitch their wagon to the Cake Boss's star. The new show fixed the credits and theirs a tiny flash of a sign "Jersey City" which if you blinked, you'd miss. At least it's factual now.

Step 2 of the proposed Heights rezoning efforts have reached a critical moment. Please consider attending this meeting on Feb 27 @ 6pm. The Heights renaissance hinges on the entire community's coordinated support of these changes. See below for more details.

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COME OUT AND SUPPORT RIVERVIEW ARTS DISTRICT (RAD) ZONING!!! CITY COUNCIL MEETING FEBRUARY 27, 6PM AT CITY HALL!!!

On February 5th, the Jersey City Planning Board recommended 4-3, two amendments to the zoning in our area for passage by the City Council: the Riverview Arts District R1 Overlay Zone and changes to zoning along Palisade Ave (R2) that will add restaurants (not drive-thru) as a permitted use.

The City Council will hold a public hearing and vote on these two amendments at its February 27th meeting (6PM, City Hall, Council Chambers at 280 Grove Street). It is IMPORTANT that the community come to this meeting to show its support.

RNA at City Council Meeting to support RAD Zoning
February 27 at 6:00pm
City Hall in Jersey City, New Jersey

"the Heights has no amenities or attractions to cause people to want to live with the general squalor and ghetto-ness of the nabe."

EXUWS guy--What you mistake for smugness on my part is pride in my block. Your tone in the last post was more even and mature and dare I say "constructive" but in the past most of your posts about the heights sound like the whiny negative rants of a miserable 5 year old and that still makes you part of the problem.

They're bedrooms and it's a cellar. It's all who you know, I suppose in this town.

A 2-family Victorian with an unfinished basement becomes a 2-family but now one of the units is a duplex because they finished the basement and turned it into livable space--wouldn't this be a zoning or some kind of violation?

Hah. I knew I'd hear from you--Vindication dude--the other longtime "Heights-trasher." You guys should get together and form a club. Both of you make broad, general negative sweeping statements about ALL of the heights and I wrote that what may be true of YOUR tiny little area/block is not true of ALL the other areas. I'm sorry both of you picked a bad block but I LOVE where I live and so does everyone else I've spoken with. The Congress Street/Riverview Fiske area is brimming over with ex-Hobokenites. Too bad you didn't choose a better area.

I've always gone to the Animal Infirmary on Adams Street in Hoboken/Michael Tuder. I've had some WONDERFUL doctors there but it's a revolving door. When my cat died at the Bayonne hospital, they sent the most beautiful sympathy card. Fast forward 6 months--my remaining and heartbroken 16 year old cat had lost weight and they suspected cancer and suggested ultrasound/surgery etc...and I said that I can't invest $5000.00 in a 16 year old cat because I'll end up in foreclosure--WHAT A BI..ch of a doctor. ATTITUDE. TERRIBLE. I adopted that cat at 7 years old and have spent over $9,000.00 hyperthyroid pill treatments, opthalmologists (they thought she eye cancer) teeth cleanings etc... I've ever been so angry. I've been taking my 2 new cats out of force of habit but they just
doublecharged me $82.00 for a felive fiv test and I had to walk over there in 10 degree weather with a new check. Not even an I'm sorry.

the Heights has nothing similar in terms of urban quality of life/surrougate borough of NYC aspect. Unless you are commuting in to midtown for work exclusively, transit is a bust (between the #87 bus and PATH it eaily takes me 1 hour to get to work in Manhattan Civic Center - 7 miles!!); the Heights has no amenities or attractions to cause people to want to live with the general squalor and ghetto-ness of the nabe.

In response to above from ExUWSguy--I know you feel trapped in the heights and regret moving there BUT this bitterness and venting/badmouthing the area is a way of shooting yourself in the foot here. If you want the area to improve so you can get the hell out of dodge, how about ixnaying the whining and trashtalking? People come to JC list and form impressions on areas based on what they read here so you're actually persuading people to not consider the heights. If what you said it were true, well, that's different but heights is large and diverse area so what may be true of your block isn't necessarily true for other areas. I know a lot of people who used to live in Hoboken who are coming up the elevator on Congress and happily renting within a few blocks.
You are part of the problem, not the solution.

I have to respectfully disagree with jcguy05--at least so far as my street. The house they purchased definitely needed updating but was by no means in danger of being vacant or boarded up. I live on one of the nicer and more desirable blocks in the Heights and I was saddened to see the house flipped and rented in spite of the fact that their tenants are friendly and respectful. Young Hoboken-type couples had been looking at the house when it was on the MLS for $224,000. This company got the house for a STEAL. They lucked out because the home's original owner died owning the house outright and as an estate sale, one of the sons grew impatient and cashed out to finance his kid's college education. Had this company not swooped in, a nice young couple would have grabbed it and the house would be owner-occupied.

NJ Cash for Homes bought the 2-family next door to me for $179,000 in cash. It was listed in the MLS and shown to nice young couples for a listing price of $225,000. It's a Victorian that's been in the same family for 50 years or more so it needed renovating. They gutted the place and threw all the old plaster and lathe into the backyard where it remained for months. What's interesting is that they sheetrocked and finished the basement and turned the downstairs rental into a duplex. It's still a 2-family but one of the units is a duplex. They listed the duplex as a 3 or 4 bedroom apartment and I think they got something like $1,800.00--$1,900.00 for it. The families that live there now and quiet and nice but there goes my chance of ever refinancing. It's some comp to deal with. All the neighbors agree that the original owner pretty much gave the house away.

Good for you PathH8tr. My experience has been the oppostite. I only wish they would follow up. I don't trust anyone else to do the job but they simply refuse to honor our contract. I think his wife is the culprit. She answers the phone and does the scheduling and she's decided that she doesn't want to deal with me--except I have a signed contract that says we're committed.

I would love to recommend Capitol Roof because I"ve heard nothing but good about them. Unfortunately, I've had a signed contract with them to repair my porch roof for months now and I've called many many times and been given the very nice (what I realize now is) brushoff from them. It's a small job that would take probably less than an hour and I've been waiting since summer being nicely strung along. Boy do I love being strung along by contractors.

It's NOT plausible that the fire dept did an "Oops. Wrong address." with the pry bar thing. If that happened, there would have been a big old firetruck with sirens blaring and red lights etc... I know. We had a small fire at the house while I was at work and they prybared the doors open and broke glass etc.... but they don't send one solitary guy. The neighbors told us that there were fire engines and several firefighters around...so ehhgg, no to the firefighter at the wrong address theory--very naive to even consider that, really--this isn't Kansas...

He's not good-looking enough to be a fireman. Just kidding. The huge baggy pants are pretty commonly seen amongst the street types, no? And if he's a fireman, where's his helmet? I don't buy the fireman thing at all.

I was thinking of getting it but after seeing the resolution quality of the photo of the burglar in Hamilton Park, I''ve decided it's not worth it. What's the point of catching someone in the act if the image is so grainy/blurry that no id can be made. I mean, isn't that point of it?

Prices doubled--not tripled--in the Heights during the boom, for me at least. I bought a loft for $150,000 in 2002 and sold it for $290,000 in December of 2007 (essentially 2008). I did cosmetic renovations and did the stainless steel appliances etc but still--nice rise in value. That same loft probably wouldn't sell for more than $200,000 right now--so the price is not double what is before. Prices here just like most of America are back at 2003 values. That bubble hurts but I still think someday Brewster will be correct if I hold on long enough.

Brewster---I wish what you said about values doubling and tripling were true but not in my case and I live on a very pretty and quiet stretch of street in the Riverview Fiske area very close to the Bakery Lofts. I bought a Victorian 2-family in December of 2007 and put 20 percent down but still can't refinance due to comps. Sigh...

vindication dude--You must be a troll. I've never read such chip on your shoulder stubborn, belligerant nonsense. I don't want a mansion for one person in Camden, the murder capital of the country with a 3 hour commute to work. Why don't you move there?

"Not every artist views him or herself as an anthropologist, but every artist needs cheap space-and plenty of it. So artists move to poor areas. And those areas begin to change.

According to Ley, when artists move to poor inner city neighborhoods property prices inflate six to tenfold within a decade.
Janet L. Abu-Lughod gives a telling anecdote about artist gentrification in her book "From Urban Village to East Village: The Battle for New York's Lower East Side." Abu-Lughod reports that in 1978, New York's Mayor Koch was so impressed with the way in which artists gentrified Soho that he proposed the same for the South Bronx. Somehow, the proposal didn't take. "

I've lived here over a decade and it's not my fantasy of the perfect place at all BUT....the Riverview Park area where I live is relatively safe, pretty in some spots (minus one gazebo since Storm Sandy), VERY affordable, fairly convenient to NYC and VERY convenient to Hoboken. I walk there every single day and if I owned a bike I'd be there in about 5 minutes flat. It's a compromise. I wanted a house with a backyard and a front porch in an urban area, not a studio in Manhattan. It's a viable alternative in that way. I'm not holding my breath for a Starbucks but there will come a tipping point time in the future. I'll probably be 80 years old but I have no doubt that it will come.

I've been waiting 10 years for the heights to gentrify and I am Finally seeing some acceleration. We now have "Yoga in the Heights" which uses the "Distillery" art gallery space for classes. We have a farmer's market and the beginnings of Movies in the park in the summer. The loft space at 500 Palisade at Bower is being rented and used by artists as gallery space. The artists are coming and where they go, gentrification will follow. From what I see, the demographic moving in is the Hoboken crowd--young, professional, educated--both single and married with babies. The light rail elevator is packed with young people and their bicyles. The Heights may never be Hoboken in our lifetime but the trend toward it is getting stronger. And don't forget that under that awful vinyl siding lurks wood frame Victorian or brick rowhouse details. These buildings need an owner with deep enough pockets to rip down the vinyl and restore....

I've lived nearby for several years now and I feel that this area of Sherman is quiet and I feel safe here. There are muggings etc... in the Heights but also quite a few in downtown Jersey City, as well so I think it's inescapable in an urban area.
You can walk to Hoboken via Mountain Road (not at night) for downtown or walk north to Congress via Ogden Avenue and take the elevator. A bicycle is handy for getting around and a cab from Hoboken path is around $8.00. I see more and more young couples walking their dogs or with the baby stroller so I would say the area is trending upward but it is a SLOW process. On the other hand, this crappy economy has not worsened the neighborhood--it's still improving.

Antiqua is not recommended at all by me. They charged a lot of money, left crap all over the front yard, the guys showed up a total of 3 days for a couple of hours at a time (for $4,500) and left without finishing the job or even addressing the cornice and flashing along the roofline-basically did nothing. Now, 4 years later, the porch is falling apart and the railing has completely detached from the column. You'd never think think this was a new porch.

When's your move-in date? What's your budget? Do you like old Victorian houses?

At first I believed it but now I agree that it's very far-fetched.
Especially the certified letter part--unless the landlord retarded, they would know that they don't have a legal leg to stand on....

No. I did the paint removal myself. Home Depot sells "Peel Away" in different formulas--numbers. I used peel away 7. You brush it on thickly and cover it for 24 hours with paper that they sell with it. Then it scrapes off and the residue is cleaned with water and steel wool. I know it sounds awful but the stuff doesn't smell or burn you skin at all. It's non-toxic. I saw some workers Hoboken removing the paint from a rowhouse in Hoboken with Peel Away. Boy did I feel sorry for them. It's something you could hire out to cheap labor--there's really no skill involved.....

C & M floors (of Hoboken or Jersey City, don't remember which) did 2 rooms downstairs in my Victorian and they used Waterlox. They have experience using it. You could hire someone to "peel-away" the lead painted floor in the other room. It's non-toxic and it would remove the paint between the gaps because it gets rinsed down with water and steel wool and that really gets into those gaps. I did this upstairs in a room in my house.

The painted floors in you 100 year old house are almost certainly lead paint. I would do both rooms at the same time and hire a dustless sanding guy. It's the only safe way to remove the paint and it's actually law now. If you wait and have just the painted floor room done separately, it'll probably cost a lot more. Your pine floors sound thick enough to not worry about another sanding down the road. My pine (or fir) I'm not sure which are in delicate condition and cannot take another sanding. They are the original subfloors, as Brewster mentioned above. but that does diminish their beauty at all, in my opinion. I don't know if you visit the old house blogs like I do but I can tell you that the subfloors were final floors when they were built and not meant to be covered like the new houses nowadays. Most people who value the beauty of an old house will restore these subfloors and enjoy as they were meant to be enjoyed and seen.