by Jeff Johnson Jr.
I lived in four other states before coming to New Jersey, and I had to go and make my first home buying experience here in the Garden State.
Fortunately, it's been a relatively happy experience, and I always suspected it was a unique experience, as well. To see if I was right, I got back in touch with the buyers' agent who helped my wife and I buy our home.
It turns out I was both right and wrong: New Jersey is unique to the extent that every real estate market is unique, says Violetta Adamidou, a licensed Realtor and a Sales Associate at Gloria Nilson GMAC Real Estate in Princeton.
With the national housing market in the business news daily, I thought it would be relevant to get a local expert's perspective on New Jersey's situation. When we bought our home in Central New Jersey nearly two years ago, we found Violetta to be trustworthy, responsive, and focused on our needs, so I couldn't think of a better person to interview for this Q&A.
(For the record, this is NOT a paid post; I have volunteered my time and questions, and Violetta has volunteered her time and answers.)
Here's what Violetta had to say:
Q: Is there anything unique about buying a home in New Jersey—anything that a buyer might not encounter in any or at least most other states?
A: This is a great question, one that already understands that markets are different everywhere. But they are not simply different because of large regions or even states. They are different by smaller regions: such as towns and townships. New Jersey, because it is densely populated and because it has so many different areas with their radically different schools systems and services, provides unique opportunities if buyers are willing to travel a bit. Many buyers will find it useful to have an agent who is licensed in PA and NJ but it is also helpful to have an agent who knows the pros and cons to buying in Pennington versus Princeton or Rocky Hill versus Montgomery. It is useful to have a perspective on each of the surrounding areas in order to make an informed decision.
Additionally our proximity to New York City and the city of Philadelphia is a major contributing factor to the differences within the state and its various counties.
Q: Everyone I know in New Jersey has hired a lawyer when they bought a house. Is this required? If not, why do it?
A: Is it required? Is it mandatory? Is it necessary? Good points and here is the reality in brief terms.
Our region and all of North Jersey does have attorneys involved in the transaction from the moment the contract is fully executed to closing. South Jersey brokers and buyers do not employ attorneys to close the transaction. They do use title companies to facilitate the process.
This is a major reflexion on the point made above: New York does use attorneys for Real Estate Contracts, Pennsylvania uses title companies. So depending on where one is purchasing a property, an attorney may or may nor be required.
Does a buyer have to use an attorney? Not necessarily. However, it does feel, if not necessary, at least preferable to have one representing the buyers interest. This is exactly where we are as a region or county.
A good agent can sometimes help even the lawyer through difficult contracts. Sometimes an extra voice, extra perspective can be very useful.
It is team work, provided all members know the rules of engagement and keep a clear focus in mind.
Q: How's New Jersey holding up compared to other places in the housing downturn at the moment?
A: Every location is different and it would be dangerous to generalize for an entire state. It is safer to say that certain areas, like Princeton, West Windsor, Lambertville and more have done quite well or doing better than others.
Overall we as a state we are in better position than specific states such as Florida, Ohio, etc., for obvious major reasons.
Q: What's attractive about living in NJ? People in other states make fun of it, but it seems OK to me. What do you think?
A: Many people are shocked at the beauty of central New Jersey, and once people get a taste of that beauty (and proximity to NYC and Philadelphia) they believe they have the best of two worlds.
The ones who make fun of it are only basing their limited opinion on driving through the state on the turnpike by the refineries ... apparently this is not how a state should be evaluated!
Q: Have you ever had an experience buying or selling a property here that made you think "only in New Jersey?"
A: I think the answer to your first question may provide an answer to this question as well. Buyers have such opportunities in New Jersey, and buyers can begin thinking they want one town and begin considering another town or they can be very oriented to NYC but discover the beauties of Philly or they can believe Princeton will provide lots of culture but then also fall in love with the nature preserves and historic buildings of surrounding towns and townships. "Only in New Jersey" could you find such opportunities and surprises.
Q: Any general advice for anyone thinking of buying or selling a home these days?
A: Don't get lost in the extreme pronouncements in the news. People are still buying and selling, and you can make an informed decision based on the specifics of each property. If there is one house that is listing for a fraction of what it listed for a year ago, is it definitely the better deal over a house that just came on the market and is priced to sell. A lot of people think they are getting tremendous deals when they go to Outlet stores, but this is not always true. You must look at the house in the greater picture and with a greater history of the market and not get seduced by the "great" deals out there. Preserve the emotional excitement but have it informed by a strong market analysis and a clear understanding of the pros and cons of the area, the property, and the price. A good agent can help you navigate through the hype.
Violetta Adamidou's profile page is available at http://www.glorianilson.com/violettaadamido.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Monday, July 21, 2008
Blogging can liberate New Jersey media
by Jeff Johnson Jr.
There are exactly two things I like about New Jersey 101.5 FM. The rest of the station's offerings don't thrill me—and they make me thankful for blogs.
I like the cheesy 70s and 80s pop music that the station plays on the weekends, with special (if implicit) focus given to New Jersey artists. (Ever heard that song "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)" by the 1970s Jersey band Looking Glass?)
Only slightly more than that, I like the unrelenting focus that WKXW, as New Jersey 101.5 is officially designated, places on the Garden State. Its slogan—"Not New York, not Philadelphia, our own radio station!"—makes the station's target audience clear.
In fact, in its traffic reports, heard every fifteen minutes around the clock, the station doesn't even utter the names of those two out-of-state cities whose metropolitan areas encompass much of New Jersey. New York City is referred to as "across the Hudson", Philadelphia as "across the Delaware," and road directions described as "leaving" or "entering" the Garden State.
What I don't like is the chatter that New Jersey 101.5 plays around the clock from Monday until Friday evening. And that's a lot of programming to not like.
Sometimes the chatter is downright offensive (as when the Jersey Guys, the station's afternoon shock-jock team, fostered hate against Hispanic immigrants), but mostly, it's just plain boring (as when night host Michele Pilenza talks about New Jerseyans and their kinky sex. This ex-Californian yawns.)
New Jersey 101.5 is an artifact of two things: (1) the way old media defines "markets," and (2) the demographic anomoly that is New Jersey.
In broadcasting, "markets" are designated as geographic areas where everyone can receive the same television or radio signals. Nielson Media, the organization that is responsible for what most of us know as "the ratings," ranks these markets according to a formula that basically shows how many listeners or viewers are likely to hear a broadcaster's message.
Obviously, this rating is partially a function of population, though if one market's viewers are found to watch more TV or radio than an adjacent market's, it could potentially affect those market rankings. (Maybe that's how, according to the list, the market of Lima, Ohio, jumped 11 spots from '07 to '08? 'Cause, if I had to live in Lima, Ohio, I'd probably watch more and more TV all the time ...)
It should come as no surprise that the main purpose of these market rankings is to estimate the potential size of target audiences for advertisers. The operative word here is estimate. I'll get back to that.
It also probably seems logical that these geographic areas usually center around a major population center. Hence, New York City is DMA (Designated Market Area) No. 1, and Los Angeles is DMA No. 2.
It's the "major population center" part that leaves room in the media landscape for a successful niche broadcaster like New Jersey 101.5.
As of the 2000 census, 8.4 million people lived in New Jersey, ranking it 11th in population. Meanwhile, the state ranks 47th in size. This easily makes the state the most densly populated in the U.S., but with no clear center.
New Jersey as a state is not on Nielson Media's list—and neither is any place in New Jersey.
Meanwhile, right at New Jersey's borders is not only New York City, but also Philadelphia—DMA No. 4.
That doesn't mean that New Jersey issues don't get covered in the media. Obviously, New York City's and Philadelphia's radio signals don't fall out of the air and sink into the Hudson and Delaware rivers. A lot of people in the Garden State receive these signals, so the Philadelphia broadcast media tend to cover South Jersey and the New York City media tend to cover North Jersey.
But I, at least, have always been somewhat disappointed with the lack of attention these outlets give to state government issues that affect everyone from Cape May to High Point, such as the state budget and the (almost literally) baroque bureacratic designs that drives up costs in ways that taxpayers in other states would have revolted over years ago. New Jersey 101.5 is perhaps the only media outlet that really does make a point of addressing these issues, but I can't stomach the station's populist jabber for more than the fifteen minutes it takes to hear the traffic report on the rare occassions when I drive on the Turnpike.
New Jersey 101.5 exists because it aims toward an audience that is, on the one hand, potentially very large. On the other hand, though, there is very little comparable data on this audience—certainly not enough for traditional media outlets to be willing to take the risk on setting up a large-scale operation here. If you've ever listened to New Jersey 101.5, one thing you can say about that station is that its owners are willing to take risks. These risks pay off in terms of advertising revenue, at least for one station.
If you're like me and you're more conservative about the tone of news (and I mean conservative in terms of prefering blandness, not in terms of political views), then you're probably not interested in the kinds of risks New Jersey 101.5 takes.
Print media's audience may not be constrained by the natural boundary of airwave range, but is slave to the fairly textbook dynamics of cost associated with the time, fuel, and materials necessary to carry their message over a great distance.
The Trenton Times and the Newark Star Ledger, arguably the most state-focused daily newspapers in New Jersey, share a web presence with several other New Jersey publications at nj.com and at least try to address these Garden State needs—but they seem to be having a hard time figuring out their identity. (Witness what dennisl, a user at Blue Jersey, calls "this travesty of the graphic arts.")
Blogging throws a wrench in the plans of the traditional media marketing models by making geography relevant only to the degree that it frames common interests.
Blue Jersey keeps a blogroll of 44 Jersey-centered blogs (inner sidebar column, scroll down, underneath their "recent comments" sidebar), most of which are generally updated regularly. I don't find all of them interesting, but I find it copelling that there are so many and that they cover such diverse topics. Several—including Blue Jersey—fund themselves in part with advertising.
Old media should take note of this, because it doesn't follow the old model.
Web advertising, of course, caters to a much more fragmented audience than broadcast or print advertising does. But one crucial difference is that you can track web advertising's effectiveness very easily.
Remember what I mentioned earlier about the purpose of Nielson Media's market rankings—to help estimate the potential size of target audiences for advertisements. There's no way you can no for sure how many people are actually tuned in on a given day to hear a radio advertisement.
A web advertisement on a blog may reach a smaller audience than a broadcast message on New Jersey 101.5—but anyone who knows enough to set up a blog also has the know-how to track the exact size and behavior of that small audience down to the type of web browser most visitors used to access the site. I talked about one of these tools, Google Analytics, briefly in my Facebook blog recently. Columbus, Ohio, blogger Leigh Householder has a post on the science of measuring web visits on her blog Advergirl.
Blogging could be liberating for New Jersey media because it enables New Jerseyans to develop an identity that transcends Sopranos references and tough-guy clichés.
And we can always download our cheesy Jersey Shore pop songs from the Internet, if we still miss them.
There are exactly two things I like about New Jersey 101.5 FM. The rest of the station's offerings don't thrill me—and they make me thankful for blogs.
I like the cheesy 70s and 80s pop music that the station plays on the weekends, with special (if implicit) focus given to New Jersey artists. (Ever heard that song "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)" by the 1970s Jersey band Looking Glass?)
Only slightly more than that, I like the unrelenting focus that WKXW, as New Jersey 101.5 is officially designated, places on the Garden State. Its slogan—"Not New York, not Philadelphia, our own radio station!"—makes the station's target audience clear.
In fact, in its traffic reports, heard every fifteen minutes around the clock, the station doesn't even utter the names of those two out-of-state cities whose metropolitan areas encompass much of New Jersey. New York City is referred to as "across the Hudson", Philadelphia as "across the Delaware," and road directions described as "leaving" or "entering" the Garden State.
What I don't like is the chatter that New Jersey 101.5 plays around the clock from Monday until Friday evening. And that's a lot of programming to not like.
Sometimes the chatter is downright offensive (as when the Jersey Guys, the station's afternoon shock-jock team, fostered hate against Hispanic immigrants), but mostly, it's just plain boring (as when night host Michele Pilenza talks about New Jerseyans and their kinky sex. This ex-Californian yawns.)
New Jersey 101.5 is an artifact of two things: (1) the way old media defines "markets," and (2) the demographic anomoly that is New Jersey.
In broadcasting, "markets" are designated as geographic areas where everyone can receive the same television or radio signals. Nielson Media, the organization that is responsible for what most of us know as "the ratings," ranks these markets according to a formula that basically shows how many listeners or viewers are likely to hear a broadcaster's message.
Obviously, this rating is partially a function of population, though if one market's viewers are found to watch more TV or radio than an adjacent market's, it could potentially affect those market rankings. (Maybe that's how, according to the list, the market of Lima, Ohio, jumped 11 spots from '07 to '08? 'Cause, if I had to live in Lima, Ohio, I'd probably watch more and more TV all the time ...)
It should come as no surprise that the main purpose of these market rankings is to estimate the potential size of target audiences for advertisers. The operative word here is estimate. I'll get back to that.
It also probably seems logical that these geographic areas usually center around a major population center. Hence, New York City is DMA (Designated Market Area) No. 1, and Los Angeles is DMA No. 2.
It's the "major population center" part that leaves room in the media landscape for a successful niche broadcaster like New Jersey 101.5.
As of the 2000 census, 8.4 million people lived in New Jersey, ranking it 11th in population. Meanwhile, the state ranks 47th in size. This easily makes the state the most densly populated in the U.S., but with no clear center.
New Jersey as a state is not on Nielson Media's list—and neither is any place in New Jersey.
Meanwhile, right at New Jersey's borders is not only New York City, but also Philadelphia—DMA No. 4.
That doesn't mean that New Jersey issues don't get covered in the media. Obviously, New York City's and Philadelphia's radio signals don't fall out of the air and sink into the Hudson and Delaware rivers. A lot of people in the Garden State receive these signals, so the Philadelphia broadcast media tend to cover South Jersey and the New York City media tend to cover North Jersey.
But I, at least, have always been somewhat disappointed with the lack of attention these outlets give to state government issues that affect everyone from Cape May to High Point, such as the state budget and the (almost literally) baroque bureacratic designs that drives up costs in ways that taxpayers in other states would have revolted over years ago. New Jersey 101.5 is perhaps the only media outlet that really does make a point of addressing these issues, but I can't stomach the station's populist jabber for more than the fifteen minutes it takes to hear the traffic report on the rare occassions when I drive on the Turnpike.
New Jersey 101.5 exists because it aims toward an audience that is, on the one hand, potentially very large. On the other hand, though, there is very little comparable data on this audience—certainly not enough for traditional media outlets to be willing to take the risk on setting up a large-scale operation here. If you've ever listened to New Jersey 101.5, one thing you can say about that station is that its owners are willing to take risks. These risks pay off in terms of advertising revenue, at least for one station.
If you're like me and you're more conservative about the tone of news (and I mean conservative in terms of prefering blandness, not in terms of political views), then you're probably not interested in the kinds of risks New Jersey 101.5 takes.
Print media's audience may not be constrained by the natural boundary of airwave range, but is slave to the fairly textbook dynamics of cost associated with the time, fuel, and materials necessary to carry their message over a great distance.
The Trenton Times and the Newark Star Ledger, arguably the most state-focused daily newspapers in New Jersey, share a web presence with several other New Jersey publications at nj.com and at least try to address these Garden State needs—but they seem to be having a hard time figuring out their identity. (Witness what dennisl, a user at Blue Jersey, calls "this travesty of the graphic arts.")
Blogging throws a wrench in the plans of the traditional media marketing models by making geography relevant only to the degree that it frames common interests.
Blue Jersey keeps a blogroll of 44 Jersey-centered blogs (inner sidebar column, scroll down, underneath their "recent comments" sidebar), most of which are generally updated regularly. I don't find all of them interesting, but I find it copelling that there are so many and that they cover such diverse topics. Several—including Blue Jersey—fund themselves in part with advertising.
Old media should take note of this, because it doesn't follow the old model.
Web advertising, of course, caters to a much more fragmented audience than broadcast or print advertising does. But one crucial difference is that you can track web advertising's effectiveness very easily.
Remember what I mentioned earlier about the purpose of Nielson Media's market rankings—to help estimate the potential size of target audiences for advertisements. There's no way you can no for sure how many people are actually tuned in on a given day to hear a radio advertisement.
A web advertisement on a blog may reach a smaller audience than a broadcast message on New Jersey 101.5—but anyone who knows enough to set up a blog also has the know-how to track the exact size and behavior of that small audience down to the type of web browser most visitors used to access the site. I talked about one of these tools, Google Analytics, briefly in my Facebook blog recently. Columbus, Ohio, blogger Leigh Householder has a post on the science of measuring web visits on her blog Advergirl.
Blogging could be liberating for New Jersey media because it enables New Jerseyans to develop an identity that transcends Sopranos references and tough-guy clichés.
And we can always download our cheesy Jersey Shore pop songs from the Internet, if we still miss them.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Update on property tax relief program
by Jeff Johnson Jr.
Here's an update on my earlier post on the Homestead Property Tax Relief program.
Applications for people who are not over 65 have been going out this first two weeks in July. Those who are over 65 should have received the application in May. That's for homeowners. For tenants, the application came with your state tax forms.
The filing deadline is August 15, 2008, for your 2007 Homestead Property Tax Relief, which is actually based on the amount of property tax that your home was assessed in 2006.
You got that?
The same filing deadline now apparently applies to all homeowners, young or old, disabled or not. Don't ask me whether the tenant deadline has moved. I can't figure that out.
My application had an ominous notice on it that "the state budget may affect rebate eligibility and amounts for 2007." So, kind of like the social security payroll tax that's withheld from my paycheck every two weeks, I'm not holding my breath that I'll ever see that money again.
Once again, the state plays the property tax shell game with its residents, giving them the psychological feeling of getting something when they're not only getting nothing, but in fact probably losing money on the deal to pay for the bureaucracy that has been in place to make state residents feel like they're getting something for the bureaucracy that they pay for.
You got that?
Here's an update on my earlier post on the Homestead Property Tax Relief program.
Applications for people who are not over 65 have been going out this first two weeks in July. Those who are over 65 should have received the application in May. That's for homeowners. For tenants, the application came with your state tax forms.
The filing deadline is August 15, 2008, for your 2007 Homestead Property Tax Relief, which is actually based on the amount of property tax that your home was assessed in 2006.
You got that?
The same filing deadline now apparently applies to all homeowners, young or old, disabled or not. Don't ask me whether the tenant deadline has moved. I can't figure that out.
My application had an ominous notice on it that "the state budget may affect rebate eligibility and amounts for 2007." So, kind of like the social security payroll tax that's withheld from my paycheck every two weeks, I'm not holding my breath that I'll ever see that money again.
Once again, the state plays the property tax shell game with its residents, giving them the psychological feeling of getting something when they're not only getting nothing, but in fact probably losing money on the deal to pay for the bureaucracy that has been in place to make state residents feel like they're getting something for the bureaucracy that they pay for.
You got that?
Friday, July 11, 2008
Download audiobooks for free in New Jersey
by Jeff Johnson Jr.
This may be the future of the audiobook section at your public library.
A consortium of public and private libraries in New Jersey has started listennj.com—an online collection of audiobooks that users can check out and listen to for a limited period. The service is free. You only need to enter your library card number from a participating library to download books.
Since I'm already juggling four different books at the moment (including a series of audio lectures on English history that I listen to on CD in my car), I haven't had a chance to try it out yet, but it looks promising.
Like a regular library, listennj.com has a limited number of copies of each item (depending on the number of licenses they've been granted, I'm guessing). Each copy can be checked out by only one person at a time. If an audiobook is checked out, you can put your name on the waiting list and receive an e-mail when it's your turn.
All of the audiobooks can be played on your PC (software download required) or on a supported portable device. Some, but not all, of the books also come with burn to CD rights. The files expire when your checkout period is over.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Solar energy: In NJ, anyone can generate and invest
By Jeff Johnson Jr.
It probably surprises no one to hear that California has installed more solar panels than any other state. I, at least, was surprised to read on June 25 in the New York Times that New Jersey is second.
The Garden State's success in promoting solar generation stems from a rebate program that has been in place until recently; those who installed solar panels—including both residential and commercial customers—were eligible for a rebate on part of the installation.
That program turned out to be too successful, in fact, and the state hopes to phase it out and convert entirely to what it calls a Solar Renewable Energy Certificate program. Under this system, customers who have a solar generation system that is hooked into the power generation grid receive certificates for excess power generation, and are allowed to sell these certificates on the open energy market.
One power customer that hopes to benefit from this system is Abiding Presence Lutheran Church in Ewing, New Jersey. (Disclosure of interest: My family attends this church.)
The church applied to the rebate program more than two years ago—a common waiting period under the current scheme— and expects its application to be approved soon. Like many customers, Abiding Presence won't even be able to begin installing the equipment without the rebate's capital.
Once the system is installed, though, it is expected to generate all of the church's annual power needs and then some. The church's solar committee hopes the revenue from the tradable energy certificates will, over a period of a few years, easily pay down balance of the loan it will take to pay for the necessary solar equipment.
According to Abiding Presence's solar committee, the energy certificates, which are issued for every 1,000 kilowatt hours of excess power generation, were expected in 2006 to trade at $200 to $250. Now they are expected to bring $400 to $600.
Solar power is part of the state's energy master plan The current draft of this plan calls for the state to get 22.5 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020. Solar energy forms a portion of the proposed renewable portfolio, along with biomass and wind energy. More than 80 percent of the expected 1,200 megawatts of wind energy capacity is expected to come from turbines off the Jersey shore.
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