Hoboken Law Blog

How cool is this:

Was at my office this Sunday and coming down the street is this great group of women laughing and having a great time, as they approached I saw that they had “Cake Boss”  T-Shirts on and I just had to take a picture.  They were full of fun and when I asked them where they were from they said “PITTSBURGH”  and that they came all the way here just to see the Cake Boss’s store, (actually they were visiting New York, but it makes for a far better story if they just came to Hoboken for the biggest celebrity Hoboken has had since Sinatra.  Passing by the store I have actually since young girls 5 or 6 years old, squealing in excitement over their chance to see the Cake Boss in Person.)  They have 3 to 4  hour lines on some days with people from all over the world.  It is so great to have such a positive person as a symbol for Hoboken.  All those politician types can’t lick the sweet spatula of the Cake Boss.  And just as I was about to leave the Pittsburghians said, “look look at the back of the shirts” and I learned a little bit about bakery slang with “Dirty Ice This” slogan, as you can see here:

The First Blimpie ever was built in Hoboken in 1964, and over the past few months this true Hoboken Tradition was almost forced to leave because of their Landlord’s tricky attempt to try and double their rent.  Well, they lost at the trial level and then went to the New Jersey Appellate Court to try and force their interpretation of the lease regarding when and how Blimpie had to give notice to renew their lease.  Thankfully, they lost again.  In this Appellate Court Decision the Law Firm of Frank Marciano successfully defended an attempt by The Hoboken Blimpie’s landlord to double their rent for allegedly failing to provide a  timely  request  to renew their lease.   You can read the decision here, but before the decision here is a little bit on the History of Blimpie:

Blimpie’s roots can be traced back to three friends armed with an entrepreneurial spirit and a business itch to introduce what the world now knows as the beloved submarine sandwich. After months of research and planning, all the components were in place for them to begin their journey of becoming business owners, with one exception - they needed a name. With a desire to set themselves apart from their competition, they decided to call their sandwiches something other than submarines or hoagies. Hoping to find some inspiration, they paged through a dictionary until they came to the word "blimp" and a picture resembling the healthy, generous-size sandwiches they saw as their competitive edge. That was the "eureka" moment, and the Blimpie sandwich and restaurant chain was born! On April 4, 1964, the three friends opened for business in Hoboken, N.J.

Today with more than four decades of history and locations from coast to coast, the Blimpie brand continues to grow with the strength of its past propelling it forward. Though times have changed since those three friends began their journey, enjoying a meal at Blimpie is still like returning to your neighborhood deli. With fresh sliced meats and high quality ingredients, Blimpie keeps the dream of its founders alive while still setting itself apart from the competition.

Marciano Blimpie Opinion

My favorite words of wisdom from a 15th Century Persian Poet Omar Khayyam as translated by Edward Fitzgerald in the 1860's.

By now most people have heard about "Short Sales" and here Short Sales and it seems that the more you know, the more complicated it gets. In trying to come up for an accurate metaphor that would encapsulate the entire short sale experience I first thought of a roller coaster:

First you going up and then your going down, then up and down again, all the time with a slightly bad sense of impending dooms, sounds like a short sale to me.

Then I thought about how it feels to be bumped from one person to another person by the bank mitigation department and visions of bumper cars came to my head:

Life in the fast bumper car lane is a lot more fun when your Father doing the driving is the Leader of the free world.

Then I thought about how you go from call to call, and though you seem to be moving ahead you find out that just when you thought you are at the end, you are forced to begin again, and I envisioned a merry go round go around and around

Most banks have what they call a short sale process, but it's more like a short sale merry go round.

I then realized it was the long lines that really summed up the short sale experience. For whatever reason the entire process is mostly about waiting and waiting for your turn to have your short sale reviewed:

This about sums up the feeling of waiting for your short sale to get approved.

It seems so simple,you want to sell your home, your mortgage is more than the value of the property, you have a buyer that is willing to buy your home for market value, the bank cannot get more money for the property if it forecloses, so the bank should allow the closing to occur and jut agree to take less then it is owed on the mortgage.

After all, Obama has personally promised to help you out of your financial problems

After all, the Banks have received billions in bailout funds and are obligated to help homeowners.

After all, it is not that complicated.

After all, it is just not fair that you should suffer because you did nothing wrong.

All the above make sense but the reality is that their is no real safety net for those people who bought into the real estate market in 2005 to 2007. The billions of dollars spent on bailing out the banks was not designed to bail out individual homeowners with negative equity. The hard fact is that in addition to the billions lost by the Banks, there has been billions and billions of equity lost by home owners that is not being bailed out by the Government. There is no plan, no laws, no rules, no government money designed to bail out individuals.

As almost a cruel joke, there is one law designed to help out homeowners, its the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007, whereby in certain circumstances, a homeowner does not have to pay federal income tax on debt forgiven on a loan secured by a qualified principal residence via a short sale, foreclosure, deed in lieu, loan workout or short refinance where the loan amount was reduced and forgiven in order for the homeowner to keep the property. In other words the government wont tax you for the amount of debt the bank agrees not to demand from you. That's all there is, and there ain't no more.

The fact is that you are on your own when it comes to dealing with mortgage debt that is more than the value of your home. Everything else is a myth.

Each bank is free to set its own rules and change them at will, each bank can decide how long and complicated the process will take, each bank can decide when to enforce a deficiency judgment, each bank can decide to answer or not answer the phones.

From my perspective, your only solution is to stop paying your mortgage and use that money to prepare for the short term effect of a bad credit rating in the immediate future. Find a good Realtor and list your home for a price slightly under it's real market value and hire an attorney, not a negotiator, to start on the process of putting together a short sale package for the bank.

As a point of reference, in a straightforward case I charge $1,500 for an upfront fee, and at least $1,500 for a closing fee. My job is to prepare a package to the bank for the short sale, maintain constant communication with the bank and negotiate a settlement. Sometimes the bank the forgive any deficiency, sometime they will forgive part of the deficiency, sometimes they will not forgive the deficiency and proceed to closing.

There is no guarantee but doing nothing is guaranteed to force a foreclosure and be charged with the full deficiency. Call me if you have any questions and need help, all I can promise is to do my best and keep you informed of the process.

In the old days, Hoboken families didn't have wash and fold, it was more like hang and dry.

It is hard to predict where the economy is headed, some pundits are even analyzing underwear sales to gauge the state of the economy, I will leave such esoteric punditry to MSNBC and will just write about what is actually happening in my law practice.

The real estate market in Hoboken is surprisingly strong. New clients are buying and existing clients are selling their condos and moving to the suburbs. There is interest in new construction where developers are offering their own incentives to seal the deal. In fact when units are priced below the market I have seen bidding wars. On the other hand, units that are priced over the market don't attract any buyers.

There is no doubt that the Government's $8,000 credit to new home owners is having a positive effect on the real estate market in Hoboken and surrounding areas. The real estate section of my Law Practice has been getting much busier after a gradual decrease in closing that began to turn around in May \ June.

The interesting part is that over half of these new contracts are with buyers who do not qualify for the tax credit due to their income level, but are ready to buy a home that is reasonable priced. I see that the sales price of the houses and condos are more in line with the new market realities. The Sellers' are accepting the fact that their homes have decreased in value and that in many cases their equity is gone. Seller's are also aware that short sales are an option, with some banks forgiving the deficiency where the seller can show hardship.

The fundamental difference in the real estate market is that buyers are no longer looking to make money on the quick sale of their purchase. They are looking for long term value and the tax benefits that come from mortgage and interest deductions.

However, I don't think the market has turned around, many people cannot afford a substantial down payment and do not have the cash flow to pay for mortgage, taxes and maintenance. If you have the money it is a good time to buy a home to live in and enjoy, just don't expect any big gains in value.

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Just received the Appellate Court's Decision in a trial I had in Hudson County Chancery Court that reversed the Trial Court's judgment. This was an interesting case involving rent control in Hoboken, reformation and rescission of a contract, and many other points of law discussing what happens when rent control issues come to play in the sale of a multi unit building. It also is a great example of how slow the legal process is and how Judges can be wrong and how the system does allow a person to appeal and overturn a judges decision. For those that are not attorneys it must not make that much sense that decisions and opinions at the trial level are not always correct. In this case the Trial judge is one of the smartest and fairest judges that I have appeared in front of, but for whatever reason he saw the case as presented in way that my client thought was incorrect, so we appealed, and thankfully three appellate court judges took the time and effort to write a 19 page opinion that reversed the trial judge's judgment so that my client won his case.

Hoboken's New Website seems to be a big step in the right direction, the more on the web the better; forms, notice, proposals, zoning information, council video all of it should be available on the web and this new website is a big step in that direction.

New_Jersey_ES.pdf (application/pdf Object)

I have been researching the use of digital signatures and come across this New Jersey Law, I will have more to say on it later.

Mortgage industry changes throw new hurdles in borrowers' way - Los Angeles Times

Centraal Station Antwerpen March 23, 2009

Solitude (a poem Feb. 25, 1883)

Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth
Must borrow it’s mirth,
It has trouble enough of it’s own.
Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air;
The echoes bound
To a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go;
They want full measure
Of all your pleasure,
But they do not want your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all;
There are none to decline
Your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life’s gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by;
Succeed and give,
And it helps you live,
But it cannot help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a long and lordly train;
But one by one
We must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.
–Ella Wheeler Wilcox, “Solitude“

"Solitude" was first published in the February 25, 1883 issue of The New York Sun. The inspiration for the poem came as she was travelling to attend the Governor's inaugural ball in Madison, Wisconsin. On her way to the celebration, there was a young woman dressed in black sitting across the aisle from her. The woman was crying. Miss Wheeler sat next to her and sought to comfort her for the rest of the journey. When they arrived, the poet was so depressed that she could barely attend the scheduled festivities. As she looked at her own radiant face in the mirror, she suddenly recalled the sorrowful widow. It was at that moment that she wrote the opening lines of "Solitude":

"Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
"Weep, and you weep alone."

She sent the poem to the Sun and received $5 for her effort. In May 1883, "Solitude" appeared in Wheeler's book, Poems of Passion.

The W Hotel from the outside.

The front desk staff showing off their W's

The W Hotel Living room. Now its quiet, at night it's not.

Some people travel around the world, others don’t. I am one of the others. So, when the opportunity came to check into a world class hotel two blocks from my office, I couldn’t resist. I booked a weekend with my wife, Judy, at the new W Hotel on Hoboken's Waterfront. In a word, "Stunning".

Upon arriving at the grand lobby we were whisked away to a level of service and style and swankiness (yes swankiness) that made it hard to believe you were still in Hoboken. The staff was wonderfully attentive, the Zylo Steakhouse was top notch, the night scene was out of a movie, the hotel room was filled with small surprises and a great big comfortable bed, and the view, well the view was just spectacular

Architecturally, it’s breathtaking, upon entering the Hotel you are swept away into a huge open interior space at least 40 feet high. On one side of the lobby a simple flat wall soared to the ceiling with nothing but the word "Welcome" glowing off the surface from a light projector on the ceiling. This image sums up the sense of boldness and lightness that is echoed throughout the lobby. The walls leading to the elevator are made out of some silver metal mesh, literally something out of a museum. The "Living Room Bar" is on the Lobby level is filled with big comfortable chairs strewn around the space to create the sense of home. The subdued use of unique textures and materials and the mix of intimate gathering spaces in a grand open space created an intimate laid back style that is more than a function of architects and blueprints.

I am sure that much of the élan throughout this building was a result of a commitment to excellence which we have come to expect from the Barry family, the owners of Applied Housing. With this building, they have spanned the decades to singlehandedly bring Hoboken out of the smoldering 70's to the forefront of successful small cities in America. The imaginative force of the Barry family cannot be overstated. Many people dream of great things but few can actually make those dreams a reality. I don’t really know Michael and David Barry, the Barry brothers as they are known in the press, but all the people of Hoboken owe them a tip of the hat for bringing world class elegance to Hoboken. With the creation of the W Hotel, Hoboken has literally shrugged off the lingering image of a quaint city on the waterfront to a small city of the world. To illustrate this point I am listing here a few of the locations where the W Hotel is located (and doesn’t it just look strange to see Hoboken in this mix)

Los Angeles, Silicon Valley , San Diego, San Francisco, Fort Lauderdale, South Beach, Atlanta, Chicago, New Orleans, Hoboken, New York, Dallas, Seattle, Montréal, Mexico City, Barcelona, Istanbul, Hong Kong, Maldives, Seoul, Hollywood, Washington D.C, Boston, Vieques Island, Greece, Athens, Milan, St. Petersburg, Morocco, Dubai, Guangdong, Macao, Shanghai, Bali, and Yokohama.

And one more thing, dogs are not only allowed but, as they told us, they are treated as guests; with their own bed, water dish and doggie treats.

Amazing; simply amazing.

Found this picture of my mother's Class of 1951 Rutgers Law School Graduation Class Picture. E. Gioia Cipriano from Orange New Jersey was the only women in her graduating class. She was treated with the utmost respect to the point when a Professor said the word "damn" in class, he apologized to Miss Cipriano for his language. She tells about how when she was in the library and had to reach up to get a book, the men would all jump up to help her.

Many years later in the same library she was doing research and had trouble reaching the book on the top shelf, and she had to get a chair was precariously balanced on one foot to reach a book and no one came to help at all. She laughed to herself thinking how much difference a few years make. When she graduated law school she wanted to get into corporate law but no law firm would hire her. She finally was able to find a firm to work for but when asked if she could type she was smart enough to feign a lack of typing skills, she knew if the partners thought she could type she would be no more than a glorified secretary.

She was first assigned to collection cases for "Kirby Vacuum Cleaners" which were sold door to door and were very expensive. The salesmen talked the people into buying these multi tasking monster machines on credit and even though the payments were 10 dollars a month many people fell behind on their payments and then the lawyers were called in to repossess the machines which were then reconditioned and sold as new to other customers. Thinking that this was not the reason she went to law school she quit that firm and began focusing on wills and estate and real estate.

A few years later she married my father, Samuel L. Marciano, a fellow law school graduate who was now living and practicing law in Hoboken. She then had three children who all become lawyerettes. As proud as she was of all of us we now are proud of her, she still is doing and planning all sorts of things and keeping her mind as young and even more active than a lot of the kids in school these days.