Report: Median new home in county $810K
Study notes about half of homes being built are age-restricted
BY KAREN E. BOWES
Staff Writer

The median price of a new single-family home in Monmouth County is now $810,000, according to a new study.

Project Manager Yen-Quen Chen of the Monmouth County Planning Department produced the report, a survey of new residential development in 2006. The report was released June 1 and is available free of charge online at www.monmouthplanning.com.

The cost of new homes ranged from $400,000 to $4 million in 2006, according to the report.

"It's basically new construction," Chen said. "The parameter does not deal with existing homes."

The median figure of $810,000 is an average of all the new homes surveyed, meaning about half of the homes cost less than $810,000 and half cost more.

So which towns saw the most development in 2006?

"Manalapan is very high," Chen said. "Western Monmouth County is also very high."

Manalapan tops the list with 807 new age-restricted single-family homes, 460 multifamily units and 594 regular single-family houses.

"We surveyed 6,756 new homes and almost half are age-restricted," Chen said. "That's 3,189, or 47 percent that were age-restricted."

Other towns that topped the list were also heavy on age-restricted units. Ocean Township built 777 age-restricted homes, Marlboro had 467 age-restricted homes and Freehold Township added 450 age-restricted homes.

Middletown, the largest municipality in the county, fell somewhere in the middle, adding 337 multifamily units and 41 single-family homes.

Chen pointed out that surveys are not an exact science and should not be viewed as such. Some smaller scale developments were overlooked, while homes built privately were also not included.

"There could be more," Chen said. "It's a survey, so it's not intended to say this is 100 percent covered."

Mixed-use residential developments are becoming a trend in waterside communities like Asbury Park, Belmar, Neptune and Long Branch, Chen said. These projects are each at various stages of construction.

"One of the larger mixed-use projects is the newly completed Pier Village in Long Branch," Chen wrote in the report. "Phase I of the Pier Village project was developed on a 10-acre piece of oceanfront property, which included 320 rental apartments and 100,000 square feet of upscale retail space and restaurants." He added that Phase II will include more housing units and commercial space.

Chen listed a sampling of other new residential developments, many still under construction. This list shows five new single-family homes being built in Aberdeen Township, 74 single-family homes in Hazlet and 41 single-family houses in Holmdel.

Information for the study was collected from various sources, according to Chen. A survey was sent to each town and to all the major developers in the county. Planners also drew on the real estate section of the county's largest daily newspaper.