Sell a Freehold House for Cash, Township or Borough

Township or Borough: Check Your Tax Bill First

A Freehold mailing address will not settle which local government you answer to. Freehold Township is the big suburban one, close to 39 square miles of subdivisions, townhouse communities and older roads, with about 36,000 residents. Freehold Borough is the compact historic center, under two square miles and about 12,600 people, and it is where Monmouth County keeps its Hall of Records on East Main Street and the Clerk's record room at Market Yard. Your property tax bill names the municipality. Everything below depends on that one line.

• 36,052Freehold Township residents, July 2025 estimate
• 12,562Freehold Borough residents, July 2025 estimate
• $553,600Township typical owner-occupied value, ACS five-year
• $416,800Borough median owner-occupied value, five-year survey to 2024

Source: U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts, Freehold township and Freehold borough, New Jersey.

The two places feel different on the ground, too. In the township, roughly five homes in six are lived in by their owners. In the borough the share is close to half, and the same survey found 54.9 percent of borough residents speak something other than English at home. A borough two-family with long-term tenants and a township colonial in a development are very different sales, and we buy both.

What Differs Between the Two Freeholds

Sources: Freehold Township Housing and Fire application forms; Freehold Borough Ordinance 2024/11; NJ Division of Taxation 2025 rates.

Freehold Township: CCO Plus a Fire Inspection

The township requires two things before a house changes hands: a Certificate of Continued Occupancy from Housing & Zoning Enforcement and a smoke and carbon monoxide certificate signed off under the Fire Official. Both applications go in together, each paid with its own check or money order, because the office takes no cash and no cards. Only after both are paid can the inspection be booked. The CCO is $150 for a single-family home, townhouse or condo and $75 for a unit at Silvermead or in one of the apartment complexes; the fire application is another $45.

The township describes these as safety inspections, and the checklist is specific. Every permit on the lot has to be closed, and work done without one, such as a replaced water heater, a new furnace, a deck, a shed or a finished basement, has to be permitted and closed out before a certificate issues. Inspectors look for house numbers at least six inches tall, ground-fault outlets near every sink, no double-keyed deadbolts, a fire-rated door from the garage, a metal dryer vent and a sump pump that discharges outside. Private well and septic properties additionally require sign-off from the township Health Department.

When a house cannot pass before closing, the township offers a Transfer of Title – No Occupancy. The smoke and CO inspection still has to pass, the buyer's attorney sends a letter in the township's wording, and nobody moves in until the buyer fixes the list and the final CCO is issued. That route is how we usually buy a township house that needs work: you skip the repair list, and the open items become ours after settlement.

Freehold Borough: the Code Compliance Inspection Certificate

In May 2024 the borough council renamed its resale certificate. What used to be the Continued Certificate of Occupancy is now the Code Compliance Inspection Certificate, and the seller must have it, or a conditional version, before the deed transfers. It is issued by the Code Enforcement Office at Borough Hall after an inspection against the 2015 International Property Maintenance Code and the state smoke alarm rules. A one- or two-family home costs $100, an apartment unit $75, the first reinspection is free, and each one after that is $150. For $100 more, the borough will try to inspect within three days.

Two borough rules catch sellers off guard. First, the certificate will not issue unless property taxes are current and water and sewer charges are paid in full on the inspection date, along with any open permit or fire fees. Second, the borough's checklist asks for a heating and hot water certification from a licensed plumber or heating contractor, plus chimney caps on fireplace flues. A sale certificate runs 90 days from the first inspection. If the house will not pass, a conditional certificate lets the sale close, but the buyer cannot occupy until it is reinspected, which is exactly the arrangement we accept.

Property Taxes in Both Freeholds

Both collectors bill quarterly, and each installment is due the first of its month: February, May, August, November. Both allow ten days of grace. In the township, Tax Collector Elizabeth Kiernan's office at 1 Municipal Plaza also collects water and sewer rents. In the borough, the collector's office at 30 Mechanic Street accepts cash, checks, money orders and certified funds, takes online payments for taxes and sewer through the same portal, and runs the borough's annual tax sale. On the state's 2025 figures, the borough's effective rate of 2.141 per $100 of value is noticeably higher than the township's 1.742. Where a tax sale certificate is already recorded against the lot, the redemption is paid from our purchase price at settlement. A 2024 law, covered in our tax lien guide, now lets an owner demand an auction instead of losing the equity.

Water, Sewer and Wells

The township runs its own water and sewer utility, drawing from ten active wells and roughly 135 miles of mains. When you sell, the township asks you to call 732-294-2023 at least 48 hours ahead for a final reading and to give the buyer's name and their attorney's contact details. Some township properties draw from a private well and use septic instead, which brings the Health Department in before the CCO. Borough homes are served by the borough's water and sewer department at 732-462-1410, and because unpaid utility charges stop the borough certificate, we ask for that payoff early. Either way, the final bills are paid at settlement from the sale proceeds, not by you in advance.

Rentals and the Borough's Historic Districts

Both towns register landlords. The township charges $100 a year for each unit in buildings of one to five units and requires a new CCO and fire inspection at every change of tenant, with the unit empty, cleaned and freshly painted, and a lead-safe certificate for rentals built before 1978. If you sell a former rental there, the township deactivates the old landlord registration. The borough takes landlord registrations through its online portal and publishes the list of registered landlords. New Jersey leases survive a change of owner, and selling is not a lawful reason to evict, so occupied units are bought with the tenants staying and their security deposits handed to us at settlement. See selling a rental in New Jersey.

The borough also has three historic districts, Downtown, Broad Street and Peach Orchard, overseen by a Historic Preservation Commission created in 2005. A listing in a district does not stop or slow a sale. It matters to whoever plans exterior changes afterwards, and as the buyer that is us.

How We Buy in Freehold

• You give us the address; we confirm from the tax records whether it is a township or borough property.
• We look at the house in person once; a written cash figure typically follows the next day.
• Once the contract is signed, we file the right certificate application, attend the inspection, and choose the no-occupancy or conditional route if repairs are needed.
• The title company settles the mortgage, taxes, utility balances and liens out of the purchase price, and you sign in person or from home with a notary.

Freehold is also where Monmouth County holds its sheriff's foreclosure auctions, on alternate Mondays, 1:00 p.m., in the Public Safety Center off Kozloski Road. If your house is on that list, a contract with us can still close before the sale date, and state law lets a homeowner in foreclosure back out of our contract within ten business days. More on that in our foreclosure guide. Both Freeholds sit in Monmouth County; nearby, we also buy in Manalapan, Marlboro and Howell.