All Forum Posts by: Marek Los

I have a quick question about the Homeward bound mortgage program, specifically the 10k grant that is being thrown around a few of the listings around Newark/Irvington.  It mentions that it's specifically for first time home buyers, unless you buy in an urban target area or are a qualified veteran.  I plan on buying something around Newark because recently my job has changed and I find myself up north.  

The only problem is that I already own a "primary" residence in Trenton, but oftentimes I stay up north with my parents.  That's why even though it's my only house, it's more of an investment property than anything. (I have tenants living there at the moment.) I am specifically thrown off by this line below:

"Borrowers of homes located within Urban Target Areas
or Qualified Veterans do not need to be first-time home
buyers, but must not own another primary residence
at closing."

If I already own a house but would like a new primary one, do I have the option to keep my current house and buy a new one or am I pretty much forced to sell?  Thanks!

https://www.state.nj.us/dca/hm...

@Stephen Chatto Thank you so much for the information, I certainly will give it a shot!  I think after reading some of the responses and going back into my situation, I think the issue is that I bought the house for a lot more than what it sold for initially.  So whether the work was permitted or not, the house certainly appears on paper to have been remodelled...and the reason I say it this way is because it's still not in incredible shape or anything, but I'm guessing that some work has been done.  So it last sold for 50k, and I paid just south of 200k for it, and so I am guessing that this increased price is what triggered the excessive property taxes.  My fault for not realizing this going in,  I will chalk this up as a learning experience.  Thanks everyone for the awesome answers and for making sense of this for me!

That's the property below...I am guessing that I bought the property for more money (some due to COVID shortages, some due to the work that was put into it) and that automatically triggered a tax reassment.  Because nobody from the city every stopped by to actually look at the place...which is how I assumed these things happen!

https://www.realtor.com/reales...

@Lance Trezona Thank you so much, that was a thorough and really good explanation...makes perfect sense.  I understand all that, but what throws me off is that the house was previously assessed to be lot higher, and then when the previous owner came in, it was cut in about half...and then now that they fixed up the place and sold it to me, looks like the assessment went right back up.   I should have realized this and shame on me, but do you think there is any value in challenging the assessment based on the value of the house and the historic data?  Maybe it would be a challenge to bring it back to what it was before, but certainly anything less than double what I am paying now would be nice!

Here is the historic tax data for my location, my new tax assessment came in around 6,700....got love NJ!

http://tax1.co.monmouth.nj.us/...

Thanks again for everything!  You mentioned your mortgage being updated with the new cost, I'm also facing a similar issue.  I haven't seen any increases in my escrow, is this something that is automatically reflected or do I need to make the changes myself?

Hi!  So I bought my first house a year ago, and everything was going really well up until I received this years property tax assessment.  For some reason, the "improvement" part of it nearly doubled, and as a result my taxes have basically doubled from 2021 till 2022.  I don't know if perhaps because the owner changed they did a new assessment of the property, but I was expecting a mild increase from one year to another, nothing like this.  I am located in the Trenton NJ area, does anyone have any advise?  I haven't improved or changed anything on the property so I'm not sure why the improvement $$ would go up so much.  

Hi there,

I recently closed on my house in the top road part of Trenton...and even though it’s only a single family house...I’ve been able to implement the rent by room strategy for this house! I do have an older style Heating system however (hot air) and I was just wondering if anyone on here can either support me with this form of beating or recommend me someone. Thanks!

Hi and happy last day of 2020!

I finally acquired my first property in the top road part of Trenton and I am currently house hacking in the non traditional sense (rent by room). The numbers make a lot of sense and I actually make a small profit every month...but I did have a small issue that I was wondering someone could support me with. The house is a single family with 5 separate rooms...but of course only one thermostat. The problem is that it’s really hard to find a nice temperature for every room (a few of them get really hot, and the tenant constantly keep the windows open.). The heating system is a hot water baseboard method...and unfortunately there is no option in each room to adjust the temperature (no valves or anything like that). Has anyone had this struggle before...and is there any possible solution here? If you have any HVAC contractors that you can recommend, that would be really appreciated!!

@Kevin Zolea Thanks a lot Kevin!  Yeah this is the only point of confusion now for me because my loan officer told me that I don't physically need to live there for more than a year, as long as I own the property for 5 years.  The feedback I am getting though from other home buyers is that they plan on living in their location for at least 5 years.  So I guess what I'm trying to figure out now is whether or not it needs to be my primary residence for 5 years, or if I simply need to own it.  I really appreciate your input, congratulations on the new house purchase by the way!

@Vaughn Smith Thank you!

Hey, sorry, more info would have helped.  And I tried to talk to my loan officer, but this is a grant that is specifically coming from the government, so it's outside of the mortgage company.  I tried to get a hold of someone from the state, but it's really tough now to get a hold of anyone.  So honestly I was hoping that someone here had taken advantage of this before, and could advise.  The program is called NJHMFA state-wide Down Payment Assistance Program, link is below.  

https://www.nj.gov/dca/hmfa/homeownership/buyers/dpa/

Hi everyone,

Sorry if the answer is obvious, but I looked around everywhere and I can't seem to find the answer anywhere.  I currently went under contract for my first house and I will be using the first time home buyers grant (which is a $10,000 grant for first time home buyers).  I can see that it comes in the form of a forgivable loan after 5 years....does that mean that I need to own the home and live it in as my primary residence for 5 years?  I am looking to buy a multi family house and then move somewhere else after a few years, but wasn't sure if I would then need to pay the grant back.  Thanks!