Best Places to Live in New Jersey 2013

Our bi-annual ranking of the best places in the Garden State to call home.

Mendham Home
Peter and Cindy Burke, with grandsons Gabriel, left, and JP, on the stoop of the West Main Street colonial they purchased 38 years ago. The Burkes enjoy the atmosphere and their neighbors. "They still sit on porches and talk," says Cindy. "That's the Main Street feel here."
Photos by Michael Yamashita

We’ve crunched the numbers, and here are the results: The Best Places to Live in New Jersey.

Our exclusive rankings (published in September 2013) are based on the most recent available data for home prices, property taxes, crime rates, school results and various lifestyle attributes. (Watch for new rankings in September 2015!)

We’ve combined the data using a proprietary formula to create the overall rankings of New Jersey municipalities. Next we stirred in additional ingredients to break out rankings for singles, young families and empty nesters.

The complete Top Towns list

Click here to visit our 2015 Top Towns list

Click on the links below to read the articles from our Top Towns package:

Alphabetical List
For your convenience, we’ve assembled an alphabetical list of all 514 municipalities.

Our Methodology
Read about how our town rankings were compiled.

Mendham: The Borough Tops Our List of New Jersey Towns
It’s not unusual for folks in Mendham Borough to lend their neighbors a hand. But more than the Morris County town’s strong sense of community makes it number one in New Jersey Monthly’s 2013 Top Towns survey.

Warren: Top Town, Central Jersey
Volunteerism is a way of life in Warren, and the people of the top Central Jersey town make it what it is. From the coaches in the recreation department to emergency services personnel to Warren’s various boards and commissions, the vast majority of hours are put in by volunteers.

Moorestown: Top Town, South Jersey
Moorestown, our top South Jersey town, fancies itself a town of winners. In 2013, the girls’ high school lacrosse team ranked number 1 nationwide. But their achievement is more than symbolic.

Hoboken: Best for Singles
Hoboken simply buzzes with life. With easy access to public transportation and a plethora of restaurants and bars, Hoboken has been transformed from a blue-collar town to a bedroom community for young, professional singles.

Monroe: Best for Empty Nesters
Empty nesters flock to Monroe. The town has more active-adult developments than any municipality in the state, comprising 50 percent of the local housing stock. As a result, almost half the population is 55-plus.

Oakland: Best for Young Families
Located on the western edge of Bergen County, Oakland is woodsy and a bit remote, but its midsize homes, good schools and low crime rate make it popular with young families.

Upper Saddle River: New Jersey’s Most Affluent Town
Situated just south of the New York border, Upper Saddle River is a five-square-mile town whose residents—many of whom are doctors, Wall Street professionals and successful entrepreneurs—are the most affluent in New Jersey, with a median household income of $180,429.

 

By submitting comments you grant permission for all or part of those comments to appear in the print edition of New Jersey Monthly.

Comments (2)

Required
Required not shown
Required not shown

  1. Umberto

    Really good article list of homes in Mahwah area Northern New Jersey. Thank you for sharing. Layne Maid Janitorial cleaning services in Mahwah has helped many of these established homes with green cleaning services. For more information on green natural cleaning and office cleaning visit http://www.laynemaidservice.com