Across 214 residential sales in the twelve months to July 2026, Scotch Plains did something unusual for this region: every price tier agreed with every other one. Two-bedroom houses closed at 102% of list, three-bedrooms at 106%, four-bedrooms at 107% and five-bedroom-and-larger homes at 104%. The town-wide 105% over an average of 29 days is therefore a real average rather than a blend of opposite markets, and the $942,500 median sits almost exactly where the volume is.
Data sourced from the Garden State MLS (GSMLS), August 2025 through July 2026.
Here are the 214 sales broken out. Read the table by price rather than by bedroom count. The dollar figure is what a buyer actually competes at.
| Bedrooms | Sales | Median sale | Avg days | Sale-to-list |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | $335,000 | 17 | 106% |
| 2 | 26 | $557,500 | 27 | 102% |
| 3 | 52 | $764,500 | 31 | 106% |
| 4 | 73 | $945,000 | 24 | 107% |
| 5+ | 61 | $1,410,000 | 34 | 104% |
| Town total | 214 | $942,500 | 29 | 105% |
Houses around $945,000 are the centre of gravity here. That segment carried 73 sales. The largest single tier in the township, and closed at 107% of list in 24 days, the fastest and strongest result on the page. If you want a picture of what a competitive Scotch Plains transaction looks like, that is it.
Above it, $1,410,000 accounted for 61 sales at 104% of list over 34 days. The premium survives at the top of the market; the pace does not. Larger houses in Scotch Plains still sell over ask, they simply take about five weeks to do it, and a seller in that band should plan around the calendar rather than around a first weekend.
Then $764,500, where 52 sales closed at 106% in 31 days. Essentially the same competitive intensity as the tier above at a materially lower entry point. The one place the market flattens is $557,500, 26 sales at 102% over 27 days. Still above asking, but it is the mildest number in town, and the explanation is condition rather than weak demand.
Two sales at $335,000 appear in the table for completeness. Two transactions cannot describe a market segment, and nothing on this page is built on them.
Scotch Plains is a seller’s market at every tier, but a temperate one. With 214 sales a year you will usually have more than one option in your band at the same time, and 29 days is a longer average marketing window than most of its neighbours give you. Expect to bid above list. The range is 102% to 107%, but expect to see a house twice before you do.
The pressure point is $945,000. That is where the most buyers are, and 107% in 24 days is what you are bidding into. The calmest end is $557,500, where 102% over 27 days means a buyer with a renovation budget and some patience has real leverage. At $1,410,000 and up, the 34-day average works in your favour: listings in that band sit long enough to be negotiated on.
Because the tiers do not disagree, pricing in Scotch Plains is comparatively straightforward. There is no hidden segment pulling the town figure away from your house. Price against your own tier and the town-wide 105% will be a fair guide.
Time is the variable to manage. At $945,000 you are in a 24-day market and should expect an early decision. At $1,410,000 and above you are in a 34-day market, and the listing that gets repriced at day twenty-one in a panic is usually the one that ends up below the 104% its tier was going to deliver anyway.
Two very different things happen to a dated house in Scotch Plains under $1 million, and lot size decides which. On a smaller lot, a home needing significant work gets no premium. It sits, and it sells at or below asking. That is part of what the $557,500 tier is showing. 102% of list over 27 days, the flattest combination in the township.
On a half acre or more, the same house is a different asset entirely. It becomes a builder target, and the buyer is paying for land rather than for the house. Scotch Plains has a good deal of ground like that, particularly at the northern, wooded end of the township, and owners in that position are routinely priced off tired-house comparables and never find out what the land was worth.
Ryan Horvath is a Prominent Properties Sotheby’s International Realty agent and a former licensed New Jersey general contractor. Having a vendor network that will put a real number on the work, and whether a lot carries builder value. Is the difference between those two outcomes.
It cuts the other way for buyers. Anyone shopping under $1 million on a large Scotch Plains lot is competing with builders, not only with other households, and should expect the bidding to reflect that.
The closest comparison is Fanwood, which shares the regional school district: an $803,000 median at 105% of list across 83 sales. Same schools, a materially lower entry price, and a far smaller market. 83 sales against 214 means fewer chances to find the specific house you want. Cranford, one town over, closed at $785,000 and 106%, and Berkeley Heights at $903,757 and 106%. All three sit at essentially the same competitive temperature as Scotch Plains; they differ in price and in housing stock, not in market conditions.
Upmarket, Westfield closed at $1,352,500 and 106% across 300 sales. The natural step up, and the town most Scotch Plains buyers price themselves out of. In the other direction, Plainfield, immediately west and in the same county, closed at $515,000 and 102% over an average of 44 days. That is the genuinely cheaper alternative in this corner of Union County, and the slower pace there is the trade-off for the lower price.
Scotch Plains has no station of its own. Rail commuters generally use the Fanwood station on NJ Transit’s Raritan Valley Line, which sits directly on the shared border, or the Netherwood and Plainfield stations on the same line a little further west. The Raritan Valley Line runs into Newark Penn Station, where most riders transfer for New York Penn Station or PATH rather than continuing on a single seat. Route 22 crosses the township and Interstate 78 is a short drive north, so a substantial share of this market drives or does a mixed commute.
Scotch Plains and Fanwood are served by a shared regional district, the Scotch Plains-Fanwood Regional School District. Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School is located in Scotch Plains and serves both municipalities, which means a buyer choosing between the two towns is choosing between price points and housing stock, not between school systems.
Scotch Plains is a large Union County township, and its size is why the market here spans from $557,500 to well past $1,400,000 without feeling incoherent. The northern end runs up into the Watchung Reservation, the wooded county park it shares with Mountainside and Berkeley Heights, and that end of town is lower density with larger lots. South and east the pattern shifts to a more conventional residential grid of mid-century colonials, capes and split-levels, with newer and rebuilt houses scattered through it.
The historic centre sits around the junction of Park Avenue and Front Street, where the township’s older buildings and its small business district are concentrated, and Park Avenue carries most of the everyday commercial life of the town. Ash Brook Golf Course, a Union County public course, occupies a large tract in the southern half of the township.
The median residential sale price in Scotch Plains was $942,500 across 214 sales recorded in GSMLS between August 2025 and July 2026. By tier, the medians ran $557,500 for two-bedroom homes, $764,500 for three, $945,000 for four and $1,410,000 for five or more.
A seller’s market at every price point, and consistently so. No tier closed below 102% of list and none above 107%, so unlike several neighbouring towns there is no price band where the conditions reverse. The mildest segment is $557,500 at 102%; the most competitive is $945,000 at 107% in 24 days.
The average sale price was $1,039,597 against a $942,500 median. The gap comes from the top of the market: 61 sales at five bedrooms or more, with a median of $1,410,000, pull the average upward while leaving the median where the bulk of transactions actually sit. For judging what a house is worth, the median and the tier figures are the more useful numbers.
Twenty-nine days on average across the township. It is faster in the middle. 24 days at $945,000, and slower at the top, where the $1,410,000-and-above tier averaged 34 days. Entry-level homes around $557,500 averaged 27 days.
Sales above $1,000,000 in Scotch Plains trigger New Jersey’s Graduated Percent Fee, formerly the “mansion tax.” Since July 10, 2025 it is paid by the seller rather than the buyer, starting at 1% of the entire sale price and rising with price. Because the rate steps up at fixed thresholds, a sale crossing one by a small margin can cost more than it gains. See the New Jersey mansion tax seller’s guide for the brackets and where the thresholds fall.
Market data derived from Garden State MLS (GSMLS), August 2025 through July 2026. Statistics reflect residential sales and are not a guarantee of future results.
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