North Jersey Market Update, October 2026

The Hoboken Connect project, there's been some changes. If you remember, there was supposed to be an office tower going up right next to the PATH station. It's not going to happen anymore. They're now turning it into apartments.

The developer had spent a few years trying to generate interest in the office space, is my guess, and my guess is they didn't get anywhere. From the start, I always did wonder why they were going to be doing an office tower in Hoboken. Since COVID, companies in New Jersey just haven't been leasing office space like they used to. I know there is a good amount of vacancy in the Newport office buildings, so it was always confusing to me why they would be building another one in Hoboken. It's essentially the same market.

So the new plan is going to be a 29-story building with about 365 rentals, 30% of them affordable housing. Construction is targeted for 2028.

And that's not all that's happening around the Hoboken PATH station. The new plaza on Hudson Place opened this past summer. Charlie, a 27-story rental tower, is also set to open next year. If you've been near the PATH station, you've seen all the construction. And lastly, the old ferry terminal is being restored into a new public space, they say by 2030. So the entire area is going to feel completely different over the next few years.

New Jersey is short somewhere between 216,000 and 253,000 homes right now, and that's from the state's own housing data. Add in future demand, and the total need over the next 10 years is roughly 350,000 to 400,000 homes. To get there, we would need to build about 35,000 to 41,000 homes a year. To put that in perspective, from 2010 to 2020, New Jersey averaged only 21,000 homes a year. So that means we need to pretty much double our pace.

Why aren't we building enough? In my opinion, it's mainly because of zoning. That's the number one reason. There's just too much red tape, and in a lot of towns it's just very hard to build. In some towns, that's a good thing. Not every town wants higher density. But in others, it's holding back housing that's needed pretty badly.

Jersey City did take a step forward in allowing accessory dwelling units, ADUs, meaning things like backyard cottages and garage conversions into a legal extra unit on the property. That kind of thing helps, but it won't close the gap on its own. But it's a positive start, and I hope more towns follow that.

The state of New Jersey just doubled its housing goal on land it already owns, from 20,000 homes to 40,000 homes. Governor Mikie Sherrill announced it at the end of September and named Bayonne, Linden, and Red Bank as places moving forward with transit oriented housing on state land.

It sounds great, but I'm skeptical. Every politician says they support affordable housing, and they all have to make these kinds of announcements. Actually getting the development going is another story on its own. The government does not have a good track record on building and maintaining housing. To be fair, the state doesn't plan on building these homes themselves. They plan to bring in private developers on the state land, which is a better model. You usually get a better product out of that.

So if it's even true, as an investor, I would watch where the state starts to invest money, by giving developers incentives or putting real infrastructure dollars into Bayonne, Linden, or Red Bank. I think it's worth paying attention to where the money goes, but until then, it's just a headline, honestly, for me.

Why does it feel like nobody's talking about the Hoboken tax increase? Why isn't it getting the publicity that Jersey City's did? Jersey City raised its municipal tax rate about 15% recently. Hoboken raised it 11.5% back in June. Both are double digit increases.

The difference is the deficit. Jersey City was looking at a gap of about $255 million and ended up borrowing $120 million from the state to help close it. Hoboken's deficit started around $17 million. So on a per resident basis, Jersey City's hole was roughly three times bigger, and it has to climb out of that.

As someone that lives in Jersey City, I see it every day. Our infrastructure is struggling to keep up with how fast the city has grown. Hoboken doesn't really seem to have that problem. So to me, Hoboken is more so getting ahead of it before they get as bad as Jersey City is, so I do think it's a good thing.

Higher taxes mean higher monthly payments, which puts pressure on prices and puts pressure on the residents. I hate that our taxes were raised, but financially the towns needed it, so it's hard to argue.

In case you haven't seen, mortgage rates are back above 7.5%, the highest they've been in three years. So the question is, should buyers be waiting for rates to drop next year? Nobody knows if they're going to. The war in Iran is definitely not helping inflation, so that's keeping the rates high right now.

I don't think anyone should be stretching to get into a home, especially with how many hidden costs come along with home ownership. But if you can afford the monthly payments right now at these interest rates, the competition is, I think, the lowest it's been all year, so you're really not having to outbid as many people. A lot of homes are sitting.

I think there's a lot of opportunity for investors and primary home buyers if you can afford it, because ideally interest rates will come down, whether it's next year or in a few years, and hopefully you can look back and say you got a pretty good deal.