Carlo Davis at The Hudson Reporter reports on the Third Annual New Jersey Gold Coast and Spring Multifamily Summit.
Developers search for new opportunities in the Gold Coast, the 19-mile stretch of New Jersey from the Bayonne Bridge to the George Washington Bridge, they are seeing their target market of renters broaden beyond the 25 to 35-year-old millennials that were once the primary focus.
The future of development in Hudson County was the topic of discussion at the Third Annual New Jersey Gold Coast and Spring Multifamily Summit, held on March 5 at Maritime Parc in Jersey City.
Jose Cruz, the senior managing director of commercial realty group HFF, L.P., said more young renters are now interested in staying on the Gold Coast, even to raise their families.
“It used to be you graduated college,” said Cruz, “went to Hoboken, you met a significant other, maybe moved up the coast to Weehawken or North Bergen, had your first child, came to Edgewater, then you go west to Morris County or Somerset County and buy your house. Today, you’re seeing that demographic stay, and either stay in Hoboken or stay along the water.”
“We’ve had to adjust the way we design our products to address that broad spectrum of renter,” said Richard Murphy, a managing director at Mill Creek Residential Trust, LLC. “We see that in how we lay out our buildings [and] the amenity packages that we have.”
Gabriel Shiff, an executive vice president at Roseland Property, said his company’s apartment buildings in Weehawken and West New York featured amenities like pools and playrooms to attract and retain these young families.
Amenity packages are becoming more important than apartments themselves in attracting millennials, according to AvalonBay Vice President Patrick Gniadek.
“They’re changing and becoming more specialized,” said Gniadek. “I’ve been in the industry for a long time and we never thought of bike repair rooms or vending machines that sold spare tires or spare parts for bicycles or dog stations.”
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