Why Upper Saddle River's Next New Homes Are Headed for an Office Park
Just off the Mountainview Road exit of Route 17 sits a vacant office building on 18.8 acres. It doesn't look like much. Under the plan Upper Saddle River assembled for New Jersey's fourth round of affordable housing, though, this site carries more of the borough's future new construction than any other single property. The address is 10 Mountainview Road. The plan calls for 135 homes there, and 27 of them would be affordable.
If you're weighing Upper Saddle River against Saddle River, Woodcliff Lake, Montvale or Ramsey, you probably know the borough for large lots and single-family homes. That picture is accurate for most of the town. The state's housing formula is now deciding where the exceptions go and what form they take, and in Upper Saddle River the answer is townhouses on the commercial and office ground near Route 17.
In 2024, New Jersey changed how municipalities get their affordable housing plans approved. The state Department of Community Affairs then assigned every non-exempt town a fourth-round obligation. Upper Saddle River's was 233. In the borough's April 2026 newsletter, Mayor Arman M. Fardanesh called 233 "a totally unrealistic number." He added that under the usual 80% market, 20% affordable ratio, it "could have imposed on the Borough an obligation to construct more than 1,000 units."
That 1,000 figure shows why the borough pushed back. In inclusionary development, the affordable units are financed by market-rate units built alongside them. An obligation counted in affordable homes therefore becomes a much larger count of total homes.
The borough's answer was a vacant land adjustment. Its plan found that, with almost no vacant developable land, Upper Saddle River's realistic affordable housing development was zero units. According to the newsletter, judges handling these cases have read the 2024 law to require towns that take this route to zone for 25% of the state number anyway.
| Step in the math | Figure |
|---|---|
| DCA fourth-round obligation | 233 affordable units |
| Total homes implied at an 80/20 ratio, per the mayor | More than 1,000 |
| Zoning required after a vacant land adjustment, 233 × .25 | 59 affordable units |
| 10 Mountainview Road | 135 homes, 27 affordable |
| 578 East Crescent Avenue overlay, if redeveloped | 8 affordable units |
| Remainder | Higher-density overlay zones on Park Way, west of Route 17 |
The neighboring towns got numbers on the same scale. The newsletter lists DCA obligations of 249 for Saddle River, 503 for Ramsey, 423 for Woodcliff Lake and 348 for Montvale. Those are the starting figures. What each town ends up zoning depends on its own plan, so if you're comparing towns, compare plans, not headline obligations.
At 10 Mountainview Road, 27 affordable homes out of 135 leaves 108 market-rate homes. That is four for every income-restricted unit. The borough's zoning for the site, introduced as Ordinance 08-26, creates an AH-6 district on Block 1002, Lot 2, an 18.85-acre parcel. It permits inclusionary townhouses with a 20% affordable set-aside and a maximum gross density of 7.2 units per acre.
The figures moved a little as the plan developed. The Housing Element the borough adopted on June 11, 2025, filed with the New Jersey Courts' affordable housing library, proposed 132 homes at the same address, 26 of them affordable. On February 18, 2026, the borough and Fair Share Housing Center entered a mediation agreement. An amended plan went to a Planning Board hearing on March 26, 2026. Then, according to Citizen Portal's summary of the council meeting, the Mayor and Council unanimously adopted Ordinance 10-26 on July 2, 2026. That ordinance created the AH-6 district at 10 Mountainview Road for 27 affordable units.
Zoning sets what may be built on a site. It does not make a construction schedule. For a buyer, the useful takeaway is the shape of future supply: townhouses, at roughly seven per acre, on a former office campus beside the highway.
The mayor's newsletter defends the density by comparison. Just over seven units per acre, it says, "is consistent with the density of other nearby developments, including The Grove at One Lake Street." It contrasts that with Fair Share Housing Center, which "has in many cases sought densities of 25 or more units per acre in nearby towns."
That comparison matters because the borough's own overlay zones go well above seven. As introduced, Ordinance 05-26 would raise maximum gross density in the OL-4 overlay to 28 units per acre on Block 1301, Lot 1.04, and 25 units per acre on the other listed Block 1301 lots. Ordinance 06-26 would add a new OL-5 overlay on Block 601, Lot 4, about 6.42 acres, allowing inclusionary multifamily housing at up to six units per acre with a 20% affordable set-aside. Both were introduced on March 5, 2026, with final passage scheduled for April 9.
An overlay doesn't replace what is on a site today. The newsletter describes the overlay zones as keeping the existing limited business and commercial zoning while also permitting residential redevelopment. Most of those properties are on Park Way, west of Route 17, and are now in commercial and industrial use. Whether any of them actually becomes housing depends on an owner deciding residential use pays better than the current tenants.
10 Mountainview Road, the Park Way overlays and the office building at 578 East Crescent Avenue all sit on ground that is commercial or office today. In the mayor's words, the plan aims to meet the obligation "without substantially altering our community's residential character."
This would not be the borough's first housing on this stretch. In May 2023, NorthJersey.com reported the groundbreaking for an affordable rental complex at 570 Route 17 North. The paper placed it just south of the Mountainview Road exit and east of the Porcelanosa store. The developer, the Housing Development Corporation of Bergen County, calls it The Residences. It has 70 apartments: 51 reserved for low-income seniors, 18 for special-needs households with a veteran preference, and one superintendent unit.
The borough's density benchmark, The Grove at One Lake Street, shows how the for-sale model works. Toll Brothers developed it as a townhouse community, and it includes 22 income-restricted one-, two- and three-bedroom homes for sale. The posted prices for those affordable homes ran from $75,000 for a low-income one-bedroom to $185,000 for a moderate-income three-bedroom. Buyers were chosen by random selection on October 13, 2021. On the market-rate side, three-bedroom townhouses started at 3,020 square feet. In a February 2025 snapshot of the community, homes marked sold had last been listed at roughly $1.02 million to $1.27 million. Those were asking prices, not recorded closings.
Those numbers show what 10 Mountainview Road's zoning describes in practice: large market-rate townhouses priced like single-family homes, carrying a smaller set of deed-restricted homes within the same community.
The New Jersey Realtors local market update for Bergen County for September 2026, current as of October 9, shows two very different segments:
These are countywide figures, and NJ Realtors doesn't publish town-level reports for Upper Saddle River. Still, the gap between the segments is large. Across Bergen County this fall, attached homes are the looser market, and single-family homes still sell above asking.
A market-rate townhouse in Upper Saddle River doesn't fit neatly into either column. Judged by The Grove's earlier asking prices, it sits above the county's single-family median and about double the county condo median. A buyer looking at new construction near Route 17 is really choosing between a newer attached home with a known maintenance structure and an older detached home on a larger lot in the interior. For a seller of a single-family home in the borough's large-lot neighborhoods, the plan places new competition at the commercial edge rather than next door.
The broader regional picture is consistent. Greater Bergen REALTORS reported for August 2026 a regional single-family median of $902,000, up 3.1%, and a townhouse-condo median of $525,000.
No. Because the borough sought a vacant land adjustment, it is required to zone for 25% of the DCA figure, which is 59 affordable units.
No. The Grove is an existing Toll Brothers townhouse community at One Lake Street. The borough cites it as a density comparison for the 10 Mountainview Road zoning.
The borough posts its ordinances in the usrtoday.org Document Center, linked above. The New Jersey Courts' affordable housing page explains the Affordable Housing Dispute Resolution Program and the deadlines set under the 2024 law.
Please treat this post as general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Zoning and affordability rules apply differently to each property, so confirm your own situation with an attorney or other qualified professional.
If you're deciding between a new townhouse near Route 17 and a single-family home elsewhere in Upper Saddle River, or wondering how the borough's housing plan affects the value of the home you own, Keren Abraham can walk you through the comparison with current numbers for your property. Let's make it happen. Get your free home valuation.
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