Why Warren's Housing Plan Ended Up Adding More Homes, and Where They're Going

At a routine Warren Township Committee meeting in April 2026, the line for public comment ran out the door of the Susie Boyce meeting room. Inaccurate text messages about development at Bardy Farms had spread around town, though the published agenda had nothing major about the property on it. Mayor Shaun Fine said early in the meeting that the information going around was wrong.

The texts were wrong about the details, but they weren't wrong that something had changed. A few weeks earlier, Warren had rezoned the Bardy Farms land along with two other properties near Mountain Boulevard. This happened because the smallest project in the township's housing plan had fallen through. If you're comparing Warren with Basking Ridge or Bridgewater, the way that played out tells you more about Warren's next decade of new construction than any median price does.

The math behind a set-aside

Warren must plan for 262 affordable homes during New Jersey's fourth housing round, which runs from 2025 to 2035. A township doesn't build those homes itself. Most of the obligation is met through inclusionary zoning, where a private developer gets permission to build a project as long as a share of the units, called the set-aside, is income-restricted. The market-rate units are what make the restricted ones financially possible.

That means every set-aside unit comes with a few market-rate homes attached. Warren's Toll Brothers zoning on Mountain Avenue allows up to 176 townhomes, 121 market-rate and 55 affordable, and requires a set-aside of at least 31%. The township's planner, Katherine Sarmad, explained the strategy at a February 2026 meeting: "Our overarching goal was to try and minimize the total number of units," she said, which meant looking for sites that offered "the highest set aside." A higher percentage means fewer market-rate homes for each affordable one.

The only way to fully break that link is a project that is 100% affordable. Warren had one in its plan.

What happened at 67 Mountain Boulevard

The township proposed a 60-unit, fully affordable rental project at 67 Mountain Boulevard. For it to work, it needed federal tax credit financing and a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement. Fair Share Housing questioned whether it could be built and objected, so Warren added three alternative sites as a fallback.

The court had given the township until March 15 to decide whether the Mountain Boulevard project would go forward. At the Planning Board's February 25, 2026 hearing, Sarmad said it "did not move forward," and the board adopted the amended plan with the three replacement sites. The township rezoned all three on March 12, 2026.

The three sites together allow 220 homes, 60 affordable and 160 market-rate. That's 160 more homes than the single project they replaced, while producing the same 60 affordable units.

The township's coverage put the total at 376 homes across round four if the all-affordable project had been built. Swap in the replacement sites and the same five-site plan reaches about 536 homes. The affordable count stays the same. The difference is entirely market-rate housing, created because the one project that didn't need market-rate support did not move forward by the court's deadline.

There's an earlier chapter, too. In March 2025, the Township Committee voted 3-2 against a mediation agreement that would have cut the obligation to 225 units, and a judge then set it back at 262.

The five sites, and where each one stands

Two of these sites add housing types Warren hasn't offered much of. The Toll zoning calls for townhomes. Ordinance 26-10 removed hotel use from the Chase property and replaced it with up to 140 age-restricted multifamily homes, including 35 affordable rentals for residents 55 and older. The Township Committee adopted it on March 12, 2026. For a Warren homeowner thinking about downsizing, that could mean a new option without leaving town, on a schedule nobody has published yet.

The Toll ordinance also requires about half of the original property to be handed over to the township for open space and recreation before construction starts. According to the Echoes-Sentinel's report, homes would go on the side along the interstate and the township would use the side closer to the center of town.

A town center by design

Three of the five sites sit close together near Mountain Boulevard and Washington Valley Road. The township chose that on purpose. Sarmad said the sites are already developed, so no open space is lost, and they're walkable, which could bring foot traffic to nearby businesses. She kept expectations modest:

"We're not saying this is going to be Westfield or Somerville. These are just going to be pockets of development, but they will probably assist in some of those businesses continuing to do well."

Mayor Fine said he "feels stronger" about the replacement sites than a fallback would suggest, calling them "bookends to the town" with set-asides of 25% to 30%. He also said the approach could "incentivize overall aesthetics and design and foot traffic in the center of town" and encourage other development beyond the affordable housing.

So when you compare towns, Warren's planned new construction is concentrated around its commercial center and Mountain Avenue, not scattered across the township. If you're weighing a house near Mountain Boulevard against one on a quieter road farther out, these five sites are now part of what's nearby.

Why the timeline is longer than the zoning suggests

Zoning gives permission to build. It doesn't set a date. Each site still has several steps ahead of it:

1. A site plan application. Toll NJ I, LLC is furthest along. Its preliminary and final major site plan and minor subdivision application, PB 26-02, was on the Planning Board's September 23, 2026 agenda. No minutes from that meeting had been posted to confirm a vote, and the board meets next on October 14, 2026.
2. Public review of site conditions. Fine, Township Attorney William Willard and Sarmad have said the Bardy Farms designation isn't an approved development. A developer would still need to submit detailed plans and go through public review covering streams, wetlands, traffic and sewer capacity. At the February hearing, a board member asked whether wetlands at the Silbert site had been taken into account.
3. Sewer capacity. Warren is split into separate sewer service areas. Sarmad said some proposed sites are in areas already at sewer capacity, and some property owners offered to help pay for upgrades. The township engineer said sites draining to Middlebrook had no current capacity issue, and sites in other service areas had been checked. Under the township's sewer rules, the applicant pays for project engineering, escrow, inspections and connections, and must show that the sewers and pumps serving the project can handle the added flow. Available capacity is calculated after counting projects that are approved but not built yet, plus anything on the waiting list.

In the meantime, the current uses are still running. Rob and Donna Bardy still operate Bardy Farms & Greenhouses at 149 Washington Valley Road, with a year-round garden center and a specialty food store. A local history piece from August 2026 says they keep the farm market and greenhouses going "for now." That same piece notes that February news reports put the Bardy site at up to 115 homes with as many as 28 affordable rentals. The township's plan lists 100 homes with 26 affordable. The plan is the governing document, but the difference shows how early this all still is.

Quick Questions

Is any of this housing for sale yet? Nothing we've found suggests so. The Toll site has reached a site plan hearing. As of early October 2026, we haven't found a community name, an approval, a construction start or a sales launch for any of the five sites.

Can the plan change again? It already has once. The township says the amended plan gives it a certified, compliant fourth-round plan, which protects it from builder's remedy lawsuits. Site-level details such as unit counts are settled one application at a time, in public hearings.

Where can I follow progress? Warren posts agendas and minutes for the Planning Board, which meets in the Susie B. Boyce Meeting Room at 44 Mountain Boulevard. Any new application for one of these sites will show up there first.

If you're thinking about a home near Mountain Boulevard, or wondering whether Warren's new townhome and 55+ options could fit your timeline, The West Oak Team can walk you through where each site stands and what it could mean for the street you're considering. Schedule a complimentary local market consultation.