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Newcomers to Denville, N.J., which sits midway between Times Square and the Delaware Water Gap, are apt to acquire something associated with the latter.
“We bought a canoe,” said Jessica Lemmon, a resident since 2018. “At first, my husband wanted a motorized boat, but we decided that a canoe” — plus kayaks for the couple’s two daughters — “would be a good start.”
Watercraft come in handy in this Morris County township, where one-third of the households reside in one of four membership lake communities developed a century ago as summer colonies. Previously Jersey City townhouse dwellers, Ms. Lemmon, 41, who works in software sales, and Alan Lemmon, 41, an electrician, bought in Indian Lake, the largest and most socially active of the lake communities, with 1,200 homes, and the only one permitting motorboats.
The couple discovered Denville while looking west, in search of a suburban home with a yard. Their new address — a four-bedroom colonial constructed as a bungalow in 1930 — is a couple of blocks from the shoreline, and cost $475,000. At the family’s disposal are three beaches, a boat slip and a clubhouse that serves as a venue for luaus, parties and yoga classes.
“Fifteen years in Jersey City, we’d never done any water sports,” Ms. Lemmon said. Besides the opportunity for recreation, she appreciates the “strong sense of neighborhood” in a township where lake residents — children and adults — compete in swimming, softball, volleyball and even horseshoes.
“In Jersey City, it was rare to see someone you knew in a restaurant or grocery,” she said. “But here you’re always running into a familiar face.”
Hiking trails, a dozen waterways and some rugged terrain notwithstanding, Denville is no backwater. The township, with 16,500 residents spread over 12 square miles, is on two New Jersey Transit rail lines and has a regional hospital. Interstate 80 and U.S. Route 46, both spanning northern New Jersey, crisscross near a well-groomed downtown with nearly 200 businesses.
Wearied by the pandemic, Alana Jermanok, 47, an assistant principal at a Manhattan middle school, and Brian Jermanok, 50, a property manager, came to Denville specifically for waterfront living. “Growing up, my family had a summer house in the Hamptons, and I have very positive memories of leaving the city environment,” Ms. Jermanok said. “We wanted to provide that experience for our son,” who is 5.
Deciding that lakefront property elsewhere was too far away and too expensive, the Jermanoks paid $750,000 for a custom-built four-bedroom, cedar-shingled house on Cedar Lake, which is surrounded by woods and was once used for ice harvesting.
For now, they are keeping their Hoboken condo and using the Denville home on weekends, and will spend summers there. When their son is older, they may relocate permanently to Denville, which has a well-regarded school system.
While living on a lake often means “being in the middle of nowhere” and doing without diversions, Ms. Jermanok said, that is not the case in Denville, as the central business district is two miles away. “It’s set up almost like a resort town, even though it’s not,” she said. “The stores are really cute. Everything about the town is cozy. Even the way people interact is cozy — they drive past you and wave.”
What You’ll Find
Denville is shaped like an arrowhead pointing south, with the lakes, downtown and train station in the northern half. It is bordered by Boonton Township to the north, Mountain Lakes and Parsippany to the east, and Randolph and Rockaway Township and Borough to the west.
Because many homes near the lakes — Rock Ridge and Arrowhead, in addition to Indian and Cedar — originated as vacation bungalows and cabins, they tend to be modest in size, and lots of one-fifth of an acre are typical. But to the south and beyond state Route 10, where an upscale strip mall has national fashion retailers and a Trader Joe’s, Denville shows a different face. Here, in an area developed in the last 45 years or so, farmland has yielded to the classic suburban tableau of large colonial houses and the occasional McMansion, on manicured lots of a half-acre or more.
In the center of New Jersey’s most affluent county, Denville has a median household income of $125,655 — $10,000 above the county median, but significantly below that of Madison, the Chathams and next-door Mountain Lakes, according to the 2019 census American Community Survey.
“Denville becomes the choice of many home buyers who can’t afford Madison and Chatham but who still want a town with a train station and a sweet downtown,” said Mary K. Sheeran, the owner of the Sheeran Real Estate Group in Denville, part of Keller Williams Metropolitan. Some 40 percent of home buyers come from New York City and densely populated regions in New Jersey, Ms. Sheeran said, and empty nesters are part of the mix: “They see living on a lake as a way to entertain the grandkids.”
What You’ll Pay
From May 1, 2020 to April 30, 2021, 297 single-family houses sold in Denville, at a median price of $460,000, according to the Garden State Multiple Listing Service. During the same period a year earlier, before the pandemic heightened demand for suburban real estate, 252 houses sold at a median price of $412,000.
Denville’s average residential property tax bill in 2020 was $10,200, $670 below the Morris County average. Homeowners in the lake communities pay less than $1,000 in annual fees.
On May 19, the listing service showed 27 properties on the market, mostly single-family homes, ranging from $185,000 for a one-bedroom condominium to $1.899 million for a working 11-acre farm. Approaching the township median, at $435,000, was a three-bedroom, two-bathroom, 1930 colonial on Warren Trail in the Indian Lake community, with property taxes of $7,927.
The Vibe
“As our downtown goes, so go our property values,” said Thomas Andes, Denville’s mayor. “Our goal is to keep it charming and quaint.”
Adorned by flower baskets placed by a beautification committee, the downtown — seemingly little affected by the pandemic or the presence of the county’s largest shopping mall five miles away — is anchored by an extra-wide Broadway with angled parking. The thoroughfare is the site of events throughout the year, including street festivals, a classic-car show and a Thanksgiving parade.
Shopping is eclectic, including swimwear and communion dresses; olive oils and day-spa services; sneakers and CBD products. A variety store/smoke shop carries penny candy, picture postcards and a huge inventory of tobacco. Across the street, a former cinema is now a chocolatier.
Dining options range from Irish pub to sushi, Puerto Rican food to Indian — and dessert usually means ice cream at the venerable Denville Dairy, which rotates through more than 100 flavors.
In a township with a shop-local tradition, “there aren’t many places where you can walk in and not know who owns the joint,” said Meg Olenowski, a lifelong resident and an owner of Sisters, one of a half-dozen clothing boutiques downtown.
The Schools
Denville’s public schools — two elementary schools and a middle school for sixth through eighth grade students — are 74 percent white, 12 percent Hispanic, 8 percent Asian and 2.5 percent Black.
The regional Morris Knolls High School, on Knoll Drive, enrolls 1,400 students. Average SAT scores in 2019-20 were 574 in reading and writing and 567 in math, versus statewide averages of 536 in both subjects. At the Morris County School of Technology, a public magnet high school on East Main Street, students scored 644 in reading and writing and 631 in math.
Other options in the township include the coeducational Morris Catholic High School and Celebrate the Children, a private school for students with autism and special needs.
The Commute
From the Denville station, commuters on New Jersey Transit’s Morris and Essex Line can reach Penn Station in Manhattan in 70 to 80 minutes without changing trains. The trip costs $15 one way or $436 monthly.
Lakeland Bus Lines provides service to the Port Authority terminal, a ride of about an hour. The fare is $12.25 one way or $104.60 for 10 trips.
The History
Iron forges along the Rockaway River and Den Brook put Denville on the map. Den refers either to Daniel Denton, a 17th-century Englishman who explored interior northern New Jersey, or to the “den” of wild animals prevalent near the waterways.
By the time the township was incorporated in 1913, iron was a distant memory and developers were touting Denville as a getaway. Among the wealthy New Yorkers who vacationed in the area was Babe Ruth, who had a place on Cedar Lake.
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