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Its not really the distance as much as it is the street that you are walking on. If Hoboken weren't fighting the NJ Transit rail yards development, this would be a great location in a few years when there was an actual urban neighborhood to walk through. However, right now there is only a sidewalk on the north side of Observer highway and its narrow. Pedestrians end up walking by a fenced in parking lot, industrial buildings, a gas station and a car wash all while squeezed right up against traffic blowing by at 50 miles an hour.

Quote: Maybe check out:

Until everything in the tri-state outside of Manhattan goes feral (2013?) and all bets are off!

There will be -0- chance of keeping the free crap army in check without Bloomberg's Private Army

Good luck selling (out) to the nouveau riche orientals before they figure out which way this grift is tilted...

I think if you look around at what has going on Downtown now - and see all the New Yorkers who have been moving in here - then it is pretty clear that you made a wise gamble. And the number of those "NYC expats" will likely keep increasing. http://www.theonion.com/articles/84-m ... ddenly-realize-new-york-c,18003/ On a side note... Quote: Well it is right next to the Hoboken PATH station - but still a 6 Block walk...
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Just to follow up on this story. The closing was delayed and the developer offered us an additional $25k to wait, which we did. We put 5% down as our initial down payment to M&M, since this was an investment, we were required by the lender to put down 25% total down payment.

After closing, the apartment was on the market for rent only 2 weeks and we had 2 potential tenants. No, we didn't get $2,500, but we did get a good rent to a very good couple. My total monthly payment is under $2,500, and as the rental market improves we hope to break even soon. As for the HOA fees of $346 per month, I am pleased to let you all know that even with the massive snow storms we were still under budget.

Mortgage $1,550, HOA $346, Taxes $515 and Landlord Insurance $47. Total monthly payment of $2,458.
Was this a Great Investment... no, but we are making the best out of it.

As a full time real estate agent I am allowed to deduct the full amount of the loss (if any). When you consider depreciation and the amount of principle that the tenants are paying, we are doing ok.

My decision to buy was to secure an affordable/luxury condo in downtown Jersey City and hold it as a long term investment. When buying Real Estate you need to think about where Jersey City will be in a few years. I lived in Hoboken and Jersey City for many years, and think they are still great investments!

PS: We have received 3 offers from potential buyers to buy this condo, including one from the current tenant. For now we are holding onto this hidden gem in downtown JC.

David Paris, Realtor
Century 21 Innovative Realty

I was told by Crescent Court that they do handle the maintenance differently and do not charge per square foot.

Also, I should clarify. I do not think he can take the full mortgage interest deduction since it will be an investment property. However, I think real estate professionals can count any real estate investment losses over a certain threshold as a deduction on their taxes unlike the rest of us mere mortals.

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My understanding from most of the places I looked at is, maintenance cost is based on the square footage of the apt. A two bedroom apt being bigger,would therefore pay a higher rate. Atleast that's how it seems to work at LH, Gulls cove, Dixon mills and other places I looked.

However if as you say he is in a high enough tax bracket to be be able to cover an $800 dollars shortfall plus put 20% percent, I am sure even a signifcant increase in maintenance should make a lot of difference to him..

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Assuming he is in a higher tax bracket, it will be much closer to breakeven after the mortgage interest deduction. Also, the 5% down payment may have been to Matzel and Mumford. He may still pay 20% at closing. Lastly, I am not sure, but I think all the maintenance fees for those apartments will be the same ($350). I am just skeptical that they can keep those payments down to $350/month. Not having a doorman will help reduce the cost greatly though.

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700 grove is next to a PATH station, yeah, sure, right...

than why they need the the shuttle?

I want more positive articles written about JC real estate and JC in general. Informercial or not.

Q: Is Mr. Paris on crack?

A: No, he's just a real estate agent.

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I looked at crecent court quite seriousily and I am not sure he's going to get $2500, especially considering the new rental units coming up at Liberty Harbor and elsewhere.

More importantly however, there's no way $2500 is going to cover the monthly owneryship cost:

Maintenance :~400 (basing this of the 350 dollars figure I was given for the one 1 bedroom I looked at there)
PMI : ~177 (he's putting less than 20% percent down)
Taxes : ~560 (calculated using the 1.5% abated rate)
Mortage payment of $2300 (calculated using 5% on 427,000)

= 3437

That's roughly 800 dollars extra he's going to cough up every month even if he gets that amount.

"Mr. Paris bought in the mid-$400,000s, with a 5 percent down payment, and estimates that the unit will rent for about $2,500 a month."

Is this guy on crack? How did he come up with that number?! I was paying $2,000/month for a relatively new 3-bedroom apartment in that area a year ago (and my apartment wasn't under the Turnpike like this one is).

For $2,500/month, you can almost get a 2-bedroom in Grove Pointe.

At Least the Agents Are Sold

By ANTOINETTE MARTIN
New York Times
Published: January 9, 2009

A COUPLE of years ago, when the market for condominiums on the western bank of the Hudson River was smoking hot, some real estate brokers felt as if they were being burned by upstart developers.


PANORAMIC VIEWS Kaja Bolton, an agent at Liberty Realty, was one of the first buyers to close on a condo at Harborside Lofts in Hoboken.

?They felt like they could get any price they put up, from people just walking in off the street,? said Teresa Visaggio, an agent at Coldwell Banker in Hudson County, ?so they would ban us: no broker sales.?

But other developers ? including two of the most prominent on New Jersey?s ?Gold Coast,? Toll Brothers City Living and Metro Homes ? cultivated sales agents, even if they didn?t have to then, because they knew it would eventually be to their benefit.

?Brokers are the eyes and ears of the market,? said Benjamin D. Jogodnik, a vice president with Toll City. ?When I want to know what?s really going on, I take a broker out to dinner.?

Quite a few brokers, often avid real estate investors themselves, wound up putting their money where their mouths are, at Toll City properties. Some 40 of them have bought $35 million worth of real estate at Toll buildings that have gone up on the Hudson waterfront over the last three years, according to Toll?s records.

Real estate sales agents have bought condos to live in, or to rent to tenants ? or both ? at four company properties, including 700 Grove in Jersey City, and Harborside Lofts at Hudson Tea, and Maxwell Place on the Hudson in Hoboken, Mr. Jogodnik said. Many of those same people have also brokered sales and are continuing to market condos in buildings where they own property, he added.

Dean Geibel, the principal of Metro Homes, said he had witnessed the same broker ?hat trick,? so to speak, at several of the buildings his company has developed in the waterfront district.

Arlene Wittig, an agent at Re/Max Competitive Edge, signed a contract two years ago for a 600-square-foot studio at Gulls Cove, a Metro Homes complex in Jersey City, intending to ?flip? the property. (The site ? beside a light rail station and a ferry stop, and four blocks from a PATH train ? seemed ?ideal for turning a profit,? she said.) Then, last year when the market began sliding in the suburbs of Somerset County, where Ms. Wittig owned a 2,300-square-foot town house, she decided to sell the house and move into her studio instead.

?I love it,? said Ms. Wittig, 53, who now commutes to her office in Somerset County. ?I can walk to fine dining, shopping, take the light rail to Hoboken, or wherever. It?s like being in Manhattan, without the added expense.

?That?s what I tell my customers,? she said, ?and that?s what I believe.? She said she had sold four other units at Gulls Cove since moving in.

David Najjar, who owns his own agency, Realty Executives, is another buyer/seller at Gulls Cove, which offers units ranging in price from the low $200,000s to more than $1 million. Mr. Najjar, 31, and his partner live in a two-bedroom corner unit with a view that takes in the Midtown Manhattan skyline as well as the Statue of Liberty.

?What I tell people is that there is real value here,? Mr. Najjar said. ?Because this neighborhood is still developing, and there are still a few empty lots around, and more amenities to come, the prices are great. With mortgage rates low, there is great value in buying right now.?

By contrast, Kaja Bolton, an agent at Liberty Realty, bought at the top end of the market, in March 2008, becoming the first resident to close at Harborside Lofts, a 116-unit building. In addition to a 1,950-square-foot penthouse with two bedrooms and a den, she and her fianc?, Steven Broomhead, paid $200,000 for one of severalprivate rooftop terraces with full-panorama views.

?I would definitely tell people I live here when they came to look at the building,? which is now 95 percent sold, Ms. Bolton said. ?I?ve sold four or five condos here now.?

Originally from Norway, Ms. Bolton says she finds Hoboken a sort of European oasis in New Jersey: a small, densely populated and walkable city. She thinks that the opening of the W Hotel this spring will bring more excitement, and that the mile-square city will weather the prevailing economic and real estate troubles quite well.

?Things are O.K. now,? she said last week. ?I have customers coming in on Monday, and out of seven properties I have to show them, in the range up to $700,000, four have offers on them already.?

Ms. Visaggio, the Coldwell Banker agent, says she has sold units at each of the Toll buildings, as well as several of the Metro Homes buildings.

She has also bought condos for herself in two different Toll buildings ? first, Maxwell Place in Hoboken, and then 700 Grove in Jersey City. The Maxwell Place purchase, in 2006, was in the complex?s first building, which sold out rapidly, said Ms. Visaggio, a 47-year-old Hoboken native. She was able to ?make a lot of money when I sold it, and decided to move to 700 Grove.?

Because this second condo is inland and next to a PATH train stop ? as opposed to right on the riverfront, like Maxwell Place ? ?I got a lot more for the money,? she said. Ms. Visaggio?s two-bedroom two-bath condo has 1,373 square feet. ?Space is important,? she said, ?because I have two puppies, and I have a large family and like to have them over.?

She says she owns another Hoboken condo that has lost about $100,000 in value since the recession hit. Rental rates, however, have stayed strong, she said, so the investment is not a losing proposition as of yet.

David Paris, a Century 21 agent in Hoboken, has just invested in a two-bedroom condo in Jersey City that he plans to rent out. Mr. Paris, 38, recently decamped from Hoboken, moving with his wife and two young children to a single-family house in Morris County.

As an investment, he bought a 1,200-square-foot apartment at Matzel & Mumford?s Crescent Court, a 54-unit midrise building with enclosed parking that is under construction.

Mr. Paris bought in the mid-$400,000s, with a 5 percent down payment, and estimates that the unit will rent for about $2,500 a month.

?I?m hoping the market recovers by September,? he said, ?but even if it is not back by then, even if I take a small loss each month for a while, I feel this is a really good investment in a well-constructed, midprice-range building.?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/rea ... ted=2&_r=1&ref=realestate