A Cheaper Time

I lived at the house next door to this rowhouse in Jersey City for some of my formative years in the early nineties. Marie Alice, Otis, and I paid $950 for a three bedroom duplex. Friends lived across the street at 58 Mercer, others lived down the block or nearby on Jersey Ave, and a guy from the band Codeine lived about three doors down. Friends, bands, and friends in bands were forever residing in the living room of our duplex. 

Marie Alice and I both left Mercer Street for our condo purchases in an old tenement on Avenue B in Manhattan, so don't feel bad for us that our attempt to buy this building didn't pan out. But wow, $4.4 million for the place next door! It has a carriage house and highly coveted parking under an extra apartment.