Livingston NJ Housing Market 2026: Prices, Rates, Taxes and Outlook

Livingston's headline number looks dramatic. According to the Redfin Data Center, the median sale price in ZIP 07039 was $992,000 in the three months ending September 2024 and $1,345,000 in the three months ending May 2026, a 35.6% rise. That is the largest gain among the three Essex County ZIPs this site tracks (Livingston, Millburn and Short Hills).

The rest of the data tells a quieter story. Over the same stretch, the median price per square foot went from $510 to $539, up 5.7%. Most of the headline jump came from larger homes making up more of the recent sales, not from the same homes becoming 36% more expensive. The real repricing happened earlier: price per square foot averaged about $436 in the year to May 2024, $523 in the year to May 2025, and $541 in the year to May 2026.

Meanwhile, sales volume fell 13% in the latest 12 months, bidding cooled from its spring 2025 peak, and the 30-year mortgage rate in the Freddie Mac PMMS climbed back to 7.03% on September 24, 2026.

How to read the Livingston numbers

The site's chart uses Redfin's ZIP 07039 series, where each month is a rolling three-month window: "May 2026" means sales that closed from March through May 2026. Each window holds only 50 to 130 sales, so the median can move $100,000 or more depending on which houses closed. Compare the same season across years, and read price per square foot alongside the median.

Livingston is overwhelmingly a single-family market in the data. In the 12 months to May 2026, single-family homes accounted for 315 of 328 recorded sales, or 96%. Condo and townhouse figures rest on one to nine sales per window.

Two years of prices and mortgage rates

What rates did

The Freddie Mac 30-year average hit a two-year low of 6.08% on September 26, 2024, peaked at 7.04% on January 16, 2025, averaged roughly 6.6% in 2025, and dipped to 5.98% on February 26, 2026, the first reading under 6% in about three and a half years. It then climbed to 6.46% in early April and 7.03% on September 24, 2026.

What Livingston prices did

Source: Redfin, ZIP 07039, All Residential.

Three things stand out.

First, the rate peak did not stop Livingston's price-per-square-foot climb. Contracts signed around the January 2025 rate high would have closed in the February to April 2025 windows, and those windows show price per square foot rising from $529 to $555 with sale-to-list holding at 105%. Buyers absorbed higher rates rather than walking away.

Second, the early-2026 rate dip did not produce a burst of competition. The windows ending February and March 2026, which include contracts written when rates were near 6%, show the weakest bidding since the winter of 2024: 101.6% to 102.0% of list, and only 40% to 43% of homes selling above list, the lowest shares in the series. Winter seasonality explains part of this, but lower rates alone did not revive 2025-style bidding.

Third, the big move in value per square foot happened between mid-2024 and early 2025. Averaging four non-overlapping windows per year gives about $436 per square foot for June 2023 to May 2024, $523 for June 2024 to May 2025 (up 20%), and $541 for June 2025 to May 2026 (up 3.4%). Since the middle of 2025, Livingston has been roughly flat on a per-square-foot basis, with a range of $507 to $568.

Why the median jumped anyway

Dividing the median price by the median price per square foot gives a rough size for the typical home sold. It is only an approximation, because the two medians need not come from the same house, but the trend is clear: about 1,950 square feet in the September 2024 window, about 2,100 in May 2025, and about 2,500 in May 2026. The typical home that sold this spring was materially larger than the typical home that sold 18 months earlier.

The single-family series shows the same pattern. The single-family median rose from $1,248,000 (May 2025) to $1,440,000 (May 2026), up 15%, while single-family price per square foot was essentially unchanged ($547 to $546).

The Redfin series cannot say why more large homes sold this spring (new or rebuilt houses, move-up sellers, or chance), so treat the mix shift as measured and the cause as unknown.

The practical takeaway: a seller of a typical 2,000-square-foot Livingston house should not assume it gained 36% since 2024. Price-per-square-foot data points to a gain closer to 6% over that period, most of it already in place by spring 2025.

Supply and competition

Fewer sales, not more listings

Source: Redfin, ZIP 07039.

Over a full year, adding four non-overlapping windows gives 329 sales for June 2023 to May 2024, 378 for June 2024 to May 2025, and 328 for June 2025 to May 2026. The latest year was 13% below the one before it.

The spring 2026 signals are mixed. New listings were 6% higher than a year earlier, yet sales were 35% lower and pending sales 17% lower. Inventory and median days on market were both lower than in May 2025. Bidding was clearly softer: sale-to-list fell three points and the share of homes going off market within two weeks fell from 55% to 37%.

A reasonable reading: well-priced homes still sell, but fewer buyers are willing to stretch. That is a shift in bargaining power, not a collapse.

Winter listings skewed high

The median list price in the windows ending January and February 2026 was $1,775,000 to $1,785,000, far above the $1,100,000 to $1,132,500 median sale price in those same windows. With only about 55 new listings per window, a few large houses can dominate that median. By May it was back to $1,279,000.

Condos and townhouses

Redfin recorded one to seven condo or co-op sales per window. The window ending August 2025 showed a median of 264 days on market, a 98.5% sale-to-list ratio and no sales above list. Since mid-2024, townhouse medians ranged from $700,000 to $1,100,000 on one to three sales. The samples are thin, but attached homes have not shared the single-family market's bidding.

Cost of ownership: property tax

According to the New Jersey Division of Taxation's 2025 general tax rate table, Livingston's 2025 general tax rate was 2.531 per $100 of assessed value and its effective tax rate was 1.882%. The effective rate adjusts for the fact that assessments sit below market values. Dividing the two (1.882 / 2.531) implies assessments averaged about 74% of market value in the state's 2025 ratio study.

Patch reported that the average 2025 Livingston tax bill was $18,465 on an average assessment of $729,727. The arithmetic checks: $729,727 x 2.531% is about $18,469.

Estimated annual tax at the effective rate, for homes valued at market:

Two cautions. First, a buyer's actual bill depends on the home's assessment, not the purchase price, so ask for the current bill during due diligence. Second, when a town's assessment ratio drifts well below 100%, as the 74% figure suggests here, a township-wide revaluation becomes more likely at some point. A revaluation shifts the tax burden among owners rather than raising the levy. No revaluation announcement was found for this article. Check ANCHOR eligibility and current realty transfer fee rules with a closing attorney.

Monthly payment and affordability

The payment math below uses the Freddie Mac 30-year averages, 20% down, and principal and interest only. Loans of this size exceed the baseline conforming limit and may need high-balance or jumbo financing, whose pricing can differ from the PMMS average.

The May 2026 median at different rates

Price $1,345,000, 20% down ($269,000), loan $1,076,000:

The move from 5.98% to 7.03% adds $743 a month on the same house. Adding the estimated $2,109 monthly tax gives about $9,290 a month at 7.03% before insurance. Under a 28% front-end guideline, that implies gross household income of roughly $398,000. At 5.98% the same house needs about $366,000.

Same-size house, 2024 versus now

Because the median is distorted by mix, a cleaner comparison uses a constant 2,000-square-foot home:

• September 2024: $510 per square foot gives $1,020,000. With 20% down ($816,000 loan) at 6.08%, principal and interest is $4,934 a month.
• May 2026 pricing at September 2026 rates: $539 per square foot gives $1,078,000. With 20% down ($862,400 loan) at 7.03%, principal and interest is $5,755 a month.

That is $821 a month more, or 17%, for the same size house. Roughly 35% of the increase comes from price and 65% from the rate. For Livingston buyers, the rate has recently mattered more than local appreciation.

Local incomes

The Census Bureau's ACS median household income for Livingston could not be re-verified for this article, so no direct comparison is made. At 7% rates, a median-priced home needs income near $400,000 under conventional ratios, or a much larger down payment.

Housing stock and what a budget buys

At the May 2026 median of $539 per square foot (20% down, 7.03%):

• $900,000 buys roughly 1,670 square feet: about $4,805 principal and interest plus $1,412 tax a month.
• $1,100,000 buys roughly 2,040 square feet: about $5,872 plus $1,725 tax.
• $1,440,000, the single-family median, buys roughly 2,670 square feet: about $7,688 plus $2,258 tax.

Condition, lot and location push individual homes well above or below these figures, and the ZIP series does not break out neighborhoods, so ask for comparable sales in the specific section of town.

Schools

Livingston Public Schools is a K-12 district serving the township, with six elementary schools (Burnet Hill, Collins, Harrison, Hillside, Mount Pleasant and Riker Hill), two middle schools (Heritage and Mount Pleasant) and Livingston High School. Third-party rankings were not independently re-verified for this article; the state's New Jersey School Performance Reports give test results and graduation rates school by school. What the market data does show is persistent demand: the single-family sale-to-list ratio stayed above 100% in every window of the past two years.

Commute and transportation

Livingston has no train station, and this is the clearest structural difference from its Millburn Township neighbors.

• Bus: Community Coach Route 77 runs between the Port Authority Bus Terminal and Livingston Mall via Main Street in Orange, Route 10 and Ridgedale Avenue, according to Moovit's route listing, which puts the full trip at about 70 minutes across 12 stops. Coach USA publishes a Livingston Mall park-and-ride schedule to Port Authority.
• Rail: the nearest NJ Transit service is the Morris and Essex Line in neighboring towns such as Short Hills and Millburn, which means driving to a station and parking.
• Driving: Interstate 280 and Route 10 cross the township. Test the drive at your actual commute hours.

The lack of rail may be one reason Livingston's price per square foot is lower than in Short Hills and Millburn.

Development and affordable housing

New Jersey's Fourth Round of affordable housing obligations runs from 2025 to 2035. According to a township announcement, Livingston submitted its Fourth Round Housing Plan to the court on June 30, 2025, and later reported that it had satisfied its full Fourth Round obligation without any additional affordable housing development. The township obtained a vacant land adjustment by showing a lack of available, developable land. The plan itself is posted on the New Jersey Courts affordable housing site.

The township reported four objections. The court agreed two proposed sites were unlikely to redevelop. A third, which proposed 35 multi-family units, was settled in a way that kept the property's existing single-family use. The fourth was withdrawn. The township also says it holds surplus credits that may apply to the Fifth Round, starting in 2035.

For the market, a large mandated multi-family pipeline looks unlikely in the next several years. New supply is likely to come mainly from resales and rebuilds, which supports existing single-family values but limits entry-level options.

Comparison with Millburn and Short Hills

Millburn Township contains two Redfin ZIPs, 07041 (Millburn) and 07078 (Short Hills). All three series below are Redfin ZIP data with the same rolling three-month method.

The comparison flips depending on the metric. On median price, Livingston posted the strongest gain of the three. On price per square foot, it posted the weakest. Millburn's per-square-foot average jumped about 20% in the latest year while Livingston's rose 3.4%.

Livingston's price per square foot is about 29% below Short Hills and 33% below Millburn. It also has far more turnover: 328 sales in the latest year, roughly four times Millburn's and more than twice Short Hills'. Buyers get more choice; sellers face more nearby competition. Millburn's sample is small (19 sales in the latest window), so read its swings with caution.

For countywide context, Redfin's Essex County single-month data show an all-residential median of $725,000 and $405 per square foot in May 2026, with 5,314 sales in the 12 months to May 2026. Livingston accounted for about 6% of those sales. The county series is single-month, so treat it as context.

Strategy for buyers

• Anchor on per-square-foot comparables for similar size and section, not the $1,345,000 median.
• Expect to pay near list, not always over: 55% sold above list in the latest window and the average was 103.6%, down from 106.6%. Homes listed beyond two weeks leave more room to negotiate.
• Get the actual tax bill before bidding; at 1.882%, a median-priced home carries about $2,100 a month.
• For a same-size home, the rate rise since 2024 added more to the payment than appreciation did, so rate timing matters as much as offer price.

Strategy for sellers

• Set expectations from per-square-foot data: about 6% since September 2024, not the 36% headline.
• Spring windows have carried more listings and sales than winter in each of the past three years.
• Price correctly on day one. With softer bidding, multiple offers are less likely to rescue an overpriced listing.
• Homes needing work compete on price against recent sales of larger, updated houses.

Outlook for the next 6 to 12 months

The data available ends in May 2026. Since then, the 30-year rate has moved from 6.46% in early April to 7.03% on September 24, 2026, the first reading above 7% since January 2025. That is the main new input.

When rates last peaked above 7% in January 2025, Livingston's price per square foot kept rising and sale-to-list held near 105%. That argues against a sharp decline from rates alone. But volume already fell 13% in the latest year, bidding cooled, and price per square foot has been flat for about a year. A rate spike on a flat market is more likely to mean slower sales and more negotiation than a rerun of 2025's gains.

A reasonable base case, stated as a conditional view rather than a forecast: if rates stay near 7%, expect price per square foot in a range similar to the past year's $507 to $568, lower sale-to-list ratios, and fewer sales than in 2025. If rates fall back toward 6%, the early-2026 experience suggests competition would improve only modestly.

What would change this view:

• Sale-to-list in the rolling window falling below about 101%, which would mark a shift from a mild seller's market to a balanced one.
• Inventory in the rolling window rising above the 2025 peak of 94 while pending sales keep falling.
• Price per square foot dropping below the February 2026 low of about $507 in a non-winter window.
• On the upside: a sustained rate decline alongside rising pending sales, or a jump in sale-to-list back above 105%.
• Locally: any township revaluation announcement, which would redistribute tax bills.

The June through September 2026 Redfin releases will show whether the summer rate increase has reached Livingston closings.

FAQ

What is the median home price in Livingston, NJ in 2026?

Redfin's ZIP 07039 median was $1,345,000 for the three months ending May 2026, and $1,440,000 for single-family homes. Because larger homes made up more of recent sales, the median price per square foot ($539) is a better guide to what a specific house is worth.

How much are property taxes in Livingston?

The 2025 effective tax rate was 1.882%, which works out to about $25,300 a year on a $1,345,000 home. Patch reported the average 2025 bill at $18,465. Always check the specific home's assessment.

Does Livingston have a train station?

No. Commuters use Community Coach Route 77 to Port Authority, which Moovit lists at about 70 minutes end to end, or drive to NJ Transit stations in neighboring towns such as Short Hills and Millburn.

Will Livingston see a lot of new affordable housing construction?

The township reports that it met its full Fourth Round obligation without new affordable housing development, so large new multi-family projects driven by that obligation are unlikely before the Fifth Round begins in 2035.

Sources

• Redfin Data Center
• Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey
• New Jersey Division of Taxation, 2025 General Tax Rates
• Patch: Average Livingston Property Tax Tops $18K
• Livingston Township: Township Fully Satisfies its Fourth Round Affordable Housing Obligation
• Livingston Township Fourth Round Housing Element and Fair Share Plan (NJ Courts)
• Moovit: Community Coach route, Livingston
• Coach USA: Livingston Mall Park and Ride to Port Authority
• Livingston Public Schools
• New Jersey School Performance Reports