New Jersey Home Seller Guides

Selling Here Has Its Own Rulebook

A house sale in this state picks up steps that owners moving in from elsewhere rarely expect. A contract drawn up by a real estate licensee goes through a three-business-day attorney review. The seller, not the buyer, owes the Realty Transfer Fee. Selling a one- or two-family house also means getting a smoke and carbon monoxide alarm certificate first, and some towns, Newark among them, add an inspection of their own on top of that.

Then there are the situations that bring people to us: an estate that has to move through the county Surrogate, a mortgage default heading toward a sheriff sale, a tax sale certificate collecting interest, a flood history that now has to go on the disclosure form. Each one has a clock attached, and the clock is usually the thing people learn about too late.

Posts here take one of those questions at a time and answer it for New Jersey specifically, with the statute, court page or state notice we relied on. When a rule differs between Newark, Jersey City and a township down the Shore, we say which town we mean. When the honest answer is "ask an attorney," we say that too.