Hoboken Open Houses Map Memorial Day Weekend

Hoboken Open Houses Map

Weekend of 5/29, 5/30

A quiet weekend in Hoboken. Plenty of free parking for all!

These free maps are a service of Brian Murray. Open houses are a great way to get a high level view of the market when just starting your search but keep in mind the following important items:

1) Open houses only represent a small portion of what is available. On any given week end in Hoboken, there are between thirty and sixty open houses. This represents as little as 5% of the total inventory. A buyer who is just starting out should see open houses in different price ranges to understand what your money will buy in terms of square footage and location. Beyond and initial five or six open houses, a realtor will save you time by working with you to help define your wants versus your must haves and the properties that really fit you best.

2) The realtor at the open house works on behalf of the seller not the buyer. The relationship is defined by NJ state law that the agent holding the open house, as part of the listing realty, is working as a seller's agent. If you tell the agent anything regarding your motivation or price range, they are obligated to tell the seller.

3) You can choose to work with any realtor even to purchase a home viewed at an open house. Meaning if you see a home you like at an open house, don't be bullied into using that agent to sign a contract. You can certainly use a seller's agent if you wish, but you can choose to work with any realtor to write, present, and negotiate the offer on your behalf.

4) The Hoboken Real Estate market is competitive. If you already have a happy relationship with an agent, let the person running the open house know as a courtesy. If you plan to work with an agent but haven't yet looked at homes together, list that realtor on the sign in sheet. There are two reasons agents have a sign in sheet. First to market their services to you. Second is for security.

5) You are not wasting my time because you are just starting out and not sure what you want. If you find value in the open house maps,The Hoboken Market Trend Report, The Hoboken Weekly Market Conditions Snapshot, The Hoboken Real Estate Report, my blog or any of the other types of information and services that I provide, please contact me before you start your search. Often, I can help you choose the best or most represntative homes to see and can schedule a few hidden gems that we can see with an extra twenty minutes.

Open Houses By Bedrooms: One Beds, Two Beds, Three Plus Beds

Open Houses By Price: Upto $430k, $430- $550k, above $550k

Map Legend:Yellow= Studio, Blue= 1 Bedroom,Red= 2 Bedrooms,Orange=3+ Bedrooms (includes mulifamiles)

Information is deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Hoboken Open Houses Map Memorial Day Weekend

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 17-24

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 17-24

So here we are speeding towards Memorial day with the home buyer credit in the rear view mirror and the dog days of summer on the Horizon. Hoboken sellers better start thinking price reductions if they want their homes sold before the back to school ads start hitting the airwaves. The number of condos under contract took a sharp downward turn this week. A harbinger of the summer to come?

47 New Condos to The Hoboken Real Estate Market
43 Price Changes
10 Under Contract
27 Sold Hoboken Properties


AN IMPORTANT NOTE: if you click on the links in the speadsheet, it opens a page with more info about the property. If you want to see additional pictures, you must register. I didn't make the system.




Still want more? Get my Hoboken Real Estate Report April update or Hoboken Real Estate Trend Report.....

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 17-24

Hoboken Municipal Garage Patriots

Hoboken Municipal Garage Patriots

Last week IHRE wrote about the City's plan to put The Hoboken municipal garage in a residential neighborhood, next to a community center and across the street from a school. Understandably residents are upset at the attack on their home values and way of life. I attended the City Council meeting to check it out. (and since I live across the street from the proposed site, I am very concerned on a personal level.)

Here is my take away:

1) The council who are in favor of this are bad politicians:
At the beginning of the meeting, there was a vote to move this issue to the beginning of the meeting. Our elected officials decided to make the public wait over three hours to speak. So much for caring about the people....but maybe in a larger sense they do!... That's three hours to showcase to the public what totally unqualified blowhards they are. In three short hours I am a much more educated voter.

2) The council and mayor will lie to your face.
Citing compromising ongoing negotiations, the council refuses to take the Jackson Street location of the table all while saying they are exploring all possible sites. No one was at the meeting for an alternative site. Do these people really think that a potential seller/lessor doesn't know the public sentiment? More likely, the mayor and council hope we will go away.

It's temporary. One citizen did some digging and found that the council was in negotiation to do a lease with option to purchase the Jackson Street site. Does that sound temporary?

3) We are a community!
In the short time since this ill conceived plan was announced, people form our community have banned together to say: enough. I can't help but think of the movie The Patriot, with Mel Gibson. In the movie, Mel was a southern farmer in Revolutionary times. As the war approached, Mel preferred to sit it out and raise his family. (A lot like many of us. I've worked across the street from City Hall for near a decade. I've watched politicians fall short on promises, have major lapses in ethics, got to jail and mainly not get caught while they lined their own pockets at the expense of the town the purportedly serve. In short, I was Mel Gibson's farmer.) Then the British bring the war to Mel, attack his home and his family. Mel gets mad and leads the militia which stops the British in their tracks and turns the tide of the war.




Council people Lenz, Cunningham, Bhalla, Marsh, and Mello have created hundreds of Mel Gibson like Patriots with their arrogance and clear display of not appreciating that they were elected by the people for the people. These Patriots all have their own militia. It's their spouses, families, neighbors, parishioners and friends.

The Hoboken municipal garage is now but the first battle in the war. It's a war on the future electability of five people who live amongst but no longer with the anonymity afforded people we trust. Mello, Bhalla, and Marsh get three more years of living off of the city before they can be stopped, while Cunningham has only one year. Plenty of time to really pay attention and fight them at every turn. Mr. Lenz is up for special election in the 4th ward. Wonder who is running against him and how we Patriots can get involved?

Learn more and get involved in the fight to stop the move to Jackson street.

For Those About To Rock We Salute You!

Hoboken Municipal Garage Patriots

Hoboken Open Houses Map

Hoboken Open Houses Map

Weekend of 5/22, 5/23

20 1br, 32 2br, 14 3+br

These free maps are a service of Brian Murray. Open houses are a great way to get a high level view of the market when just starting your search but keep in mind the following important items:

1) Open houses only represent a small portion of what is available. On any given week end in Hoboken, there are between thirty and sixty open houses. This represents as little as 5% of the total inventory. A buyer who is just starting out should see open houses in different price ranges to understand what your money will buy in terms of square footage and location. Beyond and initial five or six open houses, a realtor will save you time by working with you to help define your wants versus your must haves and the properties that really fit you best.

2) The realtor at the open house works on behalf of the seller not the buyer. The relationship is defined by NJ state law that the agent holding the open house, as part of the listing realty, is working as a seller's agent. If you tell the agent anything regarding your motivation or price range, they are obligated to tell the seller.

3) You can choose to work with any realtor even to purchase a home viewed at an open house. Meaning if you see a home you like at an open house, don't be bullied into using that agent to sign a contract. You can certainly use a seller's agent if you wish, but you can choose to work with any realtor to write, present, and negotiate the offer on your behalf.

4) The Hoboken Real Estate market is competitive. If you already have a happy relationship with an agent, let the person running the open house know as a courtesy. If you plan to work with an agent but haven't yet looked at homes together, list that realtor on the sign in sheet. There are two reasons agents have a sign in sheet. First to market their services to you. Second is for security.

5) You are not wasting my time because you are just starting out and not sure what you want. If you find value in the open house maps,The Hoboken Market Trend Report, The Hoboken Weekly Market Conditions Snapshot, The Hoboken Real Estate Report, my blog or any of the other types of information and services that I provide, please contact me before you start your search. Often, I can help you choose the best or most represntative homes to see and can schedule a few hidden gems that we can see with an extra twenty minutes.

Open Houses By Bedrooms: One Beds, Two Beds, Three Plus Beds

Open Houses By Price: Upto $430k, $430- $550k, above $550k

Map Legend:Yellow= Studio, Blue= 1 Bedroom,Red= 2 Bedrooms,Orange=3+ Bedrooms (includes mulifamiles)

Information is deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Hoboken Open Houses Map

Hoboken VS The People Of Hoboken

Hoboken VS The People Of Hoboken

Back in my younger days, when I had a lot of free time on my hands there was a computer game that I sort of enjoyed. It was called SIM CITY. SIM CITY was a game where the player acted like an urban planner to build a town into a city. You'd get points and bonuses for doing a good job. There was a budget. See you'd build homes and if you wanted people to live in them you'd build parks, and you'd build fire stations, and police stations. It was this growing complex of serving a thriving metropolis and not going bankrupt. (Sort of like a Farmville on steroids.) The great thing about SIM CITY is when you messed up, you'd get to start over.

One can only wonder if The Hoboken City Council and Mayor are playing their own version of SIM CITY only with real consequences. As if trapped in a real life "War Games" Movie, we are faced with teaching THE SIM HOBOKEN operators that this is not a game. In the movie, a pre-Ferris Bueller, Matthew Broderick, has to teach the computer controlling our nuclear arsenal that it is not playing a game but that a launch has real catastrophic results and there are no winners. In real life, our elected leaders have seemingly turned on THE SIM HOBOKEN program with no practice. Here's the latest example:

http://hoboken411.com/archives/42903

Let's move the Hoboken municipal garage to a residential neighborhood, next to a youth center, and 120 feet from a grade school. In the SIM CITY game, this would cost you points and residents would move away ,the school would close and the youth center would close. Hey, no big deal, you could always start over. In real life, would be buyers hear the noise, smell the stench and see the street parking reduced to nil as city vehicles illegally park all over the place. (Drive by Willow between Newark and Observer during the day and see what I mean.) In real life, the school is stuck too. So the little ones sit in the classrooms with the smell of recycling garbage and diesel. How distracting can it be? And the youth center...Ahh the youth center....Let's kick the community when it's down...didn't most of the families who use the youth center vote for Cammarano anyway?.......

Here's the rub: If they can "temporarily" put the Hoboken Municipal Garage in a neighborhood with a school, a youth center and surrounded by residential apartments what can they put in your neighborhood? Is anyone safe if the City starts to run unchecked and against the wishes of its residents.... Maybe a sewerage treatment plant at the end of your block. Is your way of life safe in Hoboken?... Maybe a medical waste disposal site next to the school.

Our government is going to cry poverty and no where else to put the muni garage. Do you think it's a lie? Why all of the hush hush about it? Is it because it is a lie? There were/are alternative sites but the administration did not want to pursue them because they have their own agenda. There are still a great many options but it should come as no surprise that some of the council is putting their own agenda ahead of the people they serve. SHOCKING. See if a swing voter doesn't get a cushy city job after the vote. You heard it here and I will show you when it happens. SHOCKING. like conflicts of interest and no bids contracts. SHOCKING.



Why am I mad? Beyond my livelihood... My clients are facing uncertainty in the biggest investment many of them have, their home in Hoboken. It's hard enough as a buyer or seller to deal with the ever shifting market forces, but when your own city is seemingly out to get you, enough is enough.

Let the council know you'd like them to be public servants instead of the public serving them. This is not a SIM game!

Raviner Bhalla: rbhalla@rsblawfirm.com
Theresa Castellano: email@castellanoforhoboken.com
Peter Cunningham: cunninghamforhoboken@gmail.com
Nino Giacchi: mgiacchi@juno.com
Mike Lenz: mikelenz@aol.com
Beth Mason: beth@masoncitycouncil.org
David Mello: dmello@hobokennj.org
Carol Marsh: cmarsh@hobokennj.org
Michael Russo: councilmanrusso@aol.com

Hoboken VS The People Of Hoboken

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 10-17

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 10-17

So here we are speeding towards Memorial day with the home buyer credit in the rear view mirror and the dog days of summer on the Horizon. Hoboken sellers better start thinking price reductions if they want their homes sold before the back to school ads start hitting the airwaves. I know one prominent Hoboken real estate agent who was hammering clients for between 3-5% reductions across the board.

44 New to Market
52 Price Changes
18 Under Contract
21 Sold


AN IMPORTANT NOTE: if you click on the links in the speadsheet, it opens a page with more info about the property. If you want to see additional pictures, you must register. I didn't make the system.




Still want more? Get my Hoboken Real Estate Report April update or Hoboken Real Estate Trend Report.....

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 10-17

Hoboken Open Houses May 15th & 16th

Hoboken Open Houses

Weekend of 5/15, 5/16

These free maps are a service of Brian Murray.  Open houses are a great way to get a high level view of the market when just starting your search but keep in mind the following important items:

1) Open houses only represent a small portion of what is available. On any given week end in Hoboken, there are between thirty and sixty open houses. This represents as little as 5% of the total inventory.  A buyer who is just starting out should see open houses in different price ranges to understand what your money will buy in terms of square footage and location. Beyond and initial five or six open houses, a realtor will save you time by working with you to help define your wants versus your must haves and the properties that really fit you best.

2) The realtor at the open house works on behalf of the seller not the buyer. The relationship is defined by NJ state law that the agent holding the open house, as part of the listing realty, is working as a seller's agent.  If you tell the agent anything regarding your motivation or price range, they are obligated to tell the seller.  

3) You can choose to work with any realtor even to purchase a home viewed at an open house.  Meaning if you see a home you like at an open house, don't be bullied into using that agent to sign a contract.  You can certainly use a seller's agent if you wish, but you can choose to work with any realtor to write, present, and negotiate the offer on your behalf.

4) The Hoboken Real Estate market is competitive. If you already have a happy relationship with an agent, let the person running the open house know as a courtesy.  If you plan to work with an agent but haven't yet looked at homes together, list that realtor on the sign in sheet.  There are two reasons agents have a sign in sheet. First to market their services to you. Second is for security.

5) You are not wasting my time because you are just starting out and not sure what you want.  If you find value in the open house maps,The Hoboken Market Trend Report, The Hoboken Weekly Market Conditions Snapshot, The Hoboken Real Estate Report, my blog or any of the other types of information and services that  I provide, please contact me before you start your search.  Often, I can help you choose the best or most represntative homes to see and can schedule a few hidden gems that we can see with an extra twenty minutes.

Open Houses By Bedrooms: One Beds, Two Beds, Three Plus Beds

Open Houses By Price: Upto $430k, $430- $550k, above $550k

Map Legend:Yellow= Studio, Blue= 1 Bedroom,Red= 2 Bedrooms,Orange=3+ Bedrooms (includes mulifamiles)

Information is deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Hoboken Open Houses May 15th & 16th

Hazardous Waste Days

Hazardous Waste Days

It's that time of year again when Hoboken residents get to pack up their "hazardous waste" and drive to another town to dump it.... Like some of the brown field lots in Hoboken could get more contaminaed by a few flourescent lightbulbs.

So here we go.. Driving to Jersey City, Bayonne, Kearney or North Bergen....Sellers this is a must! Dump the junk. www.njhazwaste.com

Some interesteing new changes....

If you saved alkaline batteries for Waste Days. Forget about it. Throw them out in the trash. Have we lowered our standards? Have batteries gotten safer? I don't know. Just toss them.

Latex paint... Toss it. No more midnight run and dumps in front of the Home Depot. They sell it, they should be able to process it... The waste guys want you to fill the paint can with kitty litter or some other absorbent material. Personally, I always thought it was cool to watch a can of paint explode inside the garbage truck crusher.

Back to the flourescent lightbulb.... Like the Prius with it's nickel metal hydride batteries, one can only wonder what wrath have we unleased with our exuberence for "green". Here are the official instuctions for the greenies.... When disposing of flourescent lights you must place the bulb pack in its original packaging (Like who has that), in an air tight container or wrap the bulb in celllophane, newspapaer or duct tape. This will prevent mercury contamination in the event of breakage. Scared yet? These things are in your home. Lots of them. When one burns out, you've got to have a place to store it for months. yeah that's likely. I'm going to have a few potential environmental hazards living in my condo with my family. Oops cat knocked over a bulb..better call hazmat...Do I have to disclose this when I sell????

Hey, The Hoboken Real Estate Report with May Update is now available!

Hazardous Waste Days

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate:May 3-10

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 3-10

46 New to Market
53 Price Changes
15 Under Contract
23 Sold

Heading to a post tax credit world. Fewer under contracts, more price reductions...

AN IMPORTANT NOTE: if you click on the links in the speadsheet, it opens a page with more info about the property. If you want to see additional pictures, you must register. I didn't make the system.



This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: May 3-10

Hoboken Open House Map for the weekend of May 8th & 9th

Hoboken Open House Map for the weekend of May 8th &9th.

There are 47 advertised Hoboken open houses!!! Happy Mother's Day!

16 Studios and one bedrooms
20 two bedrooms
11 three plus bedrooms

visit http://www.hobokenopenhousemap.com/ to sort by price or number of bedrooms.

Hoboken Real Estate: News and Notes

Hoboken Real Estate: News and Notes

Did anyone see what came across the wire yesterday...

Monday, May 3rd, 2010, 4:14 pm

CitiMortgage — the mortgage finance arm of Citigroup (C: 4.26 -3.40%) — today lowered its jumbo mortgage rates “for highly credit worthy borrowers” according to an e-mailed statement.

Jumbo mortgages typically fall above the $417,000 conforming loan limits. As of today, Citi will offer 30-year fixed-rate jumbo mortgages at 5.625%. It will also offer five-year adjustable-rate mortgages at 4.875%. Recent jumbo rates regularly top 6%.

Good News if you are a seller with an home priced over $525k to sell.

....Heard that with the new zoning regulations that the backlog for any building project that needs zoning approvals is nine months. Great to see Hoboken working for it's citizens. Heck, I might be able to get an answer from Bank Of America of a short sale faster than that. Here's an idea...charge more money for the zoning applications. use the money to pay more people to be on the zoning board. Split the zoning board in two and handle twice as many applications in the same time. ...upsetting the apple cart of political power and entitlements again. forget it.

....Bike lane on Hudson Street? Rumor has it that the face in parking was replaced by parallel parking in order to put a bike lane in. Where are those parking spaces going? Does the city think that the cars will just "disappear"? The cynical me thinks that fewer parking spaces means more illegal parking and more illegal parking revenue. Time to buy another boot van. Here's an idea: Let's make all of the parking around city hall resident parking. How about our esteemed Hoboken employees get treated like the rest of us who pay taxes here. Would love to "The Commissioner Of Some Bloated Department The City Doesn't Need But Who Has A Cousin" have to circle the block for 45 minutes and not have any quarters. (Yes, I sit up late at night after watching Jack Bauer and I think of what would Jack do.)

A different kind of Boot Van.

Don't forget. The Hoboken Real Estate Report with May updates will be out next week sign up today.

Hoboken Real Estate: News and Notes

Title Insurance: Why You Need It

Title Insurance: Why You Need It

Many buyers are confused about title insurance. Most think it is another thing cooked up by the banks to drive up the cost of real estate transfer. The truth is that while it is expensive, it can be critical, especially in Hoboken.
What is title insurance anyway?

From our friends at Wikipedia... Title insurance in the United States is indemnity insurance against financial loss from defects in title to real property and from the invalidity or unenforceability of mortgage liens. Title insurance is principally a product developed and sold in the United States as a result of the comparative deficiency of the US land records laws. It is meant to protect an owner's or a lender's financial interest in real property against loss due to title defects, liens or other matters. It will defend against a lawsuit attacking the title as it is insured, or reimburse the insured for the actual monetary loss incurred, up to the dollar amount of insurance provided by the policy. The first title insurance company, the Law Property Assurance and Trust Society, was formed in Pennsylvania in 1853.[1] The vast majority of title insurance policies are written on land within the U.S.

Typically the real property interests insured are fee simple ownership or a mortgage. However, title insurance can be purchased to insure any interest in real property, including an easement, lease or life estate. Just as lenders require fire insurance and other types of insurance coverage to protect their investment, nearly all institutional lenders also require title insurance to protect their interest in the collateral of loans secured by real estate. Some mortgage lenders, especially non-institutional lenders, may not require title insurance.

What is important is that title insurance will not protect your property as much as it protects your investment.

Why do I need it if the mortgage company also does a title search?

The title insurance is a backstop in case the title search misses something. Is it possible? absolutely. Have you ever been to the county records department in Journal Square. It's filled with a bunch of "moles" locked in this windowless room, hacking away on terminals looking for liens against properties. It's like a little fraternity of politically incorrect partially shaven, partially bathed glorified fast food workers. I am sure their work is impeccable, even if their hygiene isn't.
Title Problems in Hoboken.

Two words for you. Riparian rights. Riparian refers to water. ( I learned that while studying for my real estate license. Never thought I would need it since I wasn't planning on selling lake front homes...) In case some readers are not familiar, Hoboken used to be all streams and canals. Then the land was filled in, factories built, factories torn down, homes built, homes torn down apartment building built. Ahh but what about those riparian rights? Seems as though the State of New Jersey has land rights to the riverbeds. Rights do not just go away even when the river runs dry, factories are built, factories are torn down, homes are built, homes are torn down and condo buildings are built. So The State of New Jersey wants it's pound of flesh a century and a half later. Title companies are scrambling....What if they are out of business? I don't know. Hire a lawyer I guess. I do know the state has claims and will be looking for some way to pay for all of those excess state workers.

What does this mean to the Hoboken Homeowner?

Probably not a big deal unless you are selling. Then what? Depends on the buyer's mortgage company and the results of a title search. Banks are looking for any excuse not to lend. Do you think a cloud on the title based on a centuries old claim by the state government might be one of them? However, if your title company is working to settle with Mr. Christie then maybe you get to sell and move to Montclair or some higher elevation.

After two days in the desert sun
my skin began to turn red.
After three days in the desert sun
I was looking at a river bed.
And the story it told of a river that flowed
made me sad to think it was dead.

Title Insurance: Why You Need It

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: April 26- May 3

This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: April 26- May 3

38 New to Market
43 Price Changes
36 Under Contract
21 Sold

Heading to a post tax credit world. Few new to market, fewer price reductions...

AN IMPORTANT NOTE: if you click on the links in the speadsheet, it opens a page with more info about the property. If you want to see additional pictures, you must register. I didn't make the system.



This Week In Hoboken Real Estate: April 26- May 3