On September 10, 2026, the Lumberton Land Development Board voted 5–3 to approve D.R. Horton's "Lumberton Village." The approval covers preliminary and final major site plan and subdivision for 857 homes on the north part of a 412-acre tract on Eayrestown Road. It comes with engineering conditions and still needs signoffs from the county, the MUA and the DEP. That account comes from a Citizen Portal summary of the meeting. Citizen Portal is an AI-generated recap tied to the meeting video, which the township links from its Land Development Board page.
Under the redevelopment agreement, homes in the same development will be taxed in three different ways depending on their type. Most of what's coming is townhouses, and in Burlington County, townhouse-condo inventory is rising much faster than single-family inventory.
One Development, Three Ways of Being Taxed
The Township Committee named D.R. Horton as redeveloper on August 6, 2026. The resolution it adopted spells out exactly what gets built and how each piece is treated for tax purposes.
| Unit type | Count | Tax arrangement in the agreement |
|---|---|---|
| Market-rate townhomes, no age restriction | 506 | No special arrangement named in the resolution |
| Age-restricted market-rate units | 179 | Five-year tax abatement/exemption under N.J.S.A. 40A:21 |
| Age-restricted affordable units | 80 | Covered by a 30-year payment in lieu of taxes (PILOT) agreement |
| Family affordable units | 92 | Covered by the same 30-year PILOT agreement |
70and73.com describes the full project as a $77 million development. It calls the 179 age-restricted market-rate units senior townhouses and the 172 affordable units apartments. At the August 6 meeting, the township's affordable housing attorney said the project's PILOTs apply to the affordable units, and that a PILOT has to be arranged through the town, not the school district.
So 685 of the 857 homes are market-rate townhouses. Of those 685, about one in four starts out with a temporary tax exemption that the rest don't get.
Why the Mix Looks Like This
The unit counts weren't picked at random. Lumberton's amended redevelopment plan, adopted December 4, 2025, sets the rules for the site. Run the project's numbers against those rules and they land almost exactly on the limits:
- Affordable share: The plan requires at least 20% deed-restricted affordable units. 172 of 857 works out to just over 20%.
- Age-restricted market-rate share: The plan requires at least 25% of market-rate units to be age-restricted. 179 of 685 is about 26%.
- Age-restricted affordable units: The plan requires at least 80, and the project has exactly 80.
- Multifamily cap: The plan allows multifamily units up to 25% of the total. The 172 apartments come to about 20%.
- Density: The plan caps gross density at 2.1 units per acre. 857 units on a 412-acre tract is about 2.08.
The rules themselves trace back to state affordable housing obligations. The township's project page explains that the site was first planned in 2018 for 629 units, including 95 affordable, to meet the state's Round Three obligation. No redeveloper got past the concept stage, and the plan was amended in 2025 to cover both Round Three and Round Four. At a May community meeting at Bobby's Run School, the township's affordable housing lawyer, Michael Herbert, put it bluntly to residents, as 70and73.com reported:
"We're stuck. We're under court order. We have to proceed."
That explains the split. The affordable requirement brings the PILOT. The age-restriction requirement produces the 179 senior units, and those carry the five-year exemption. Everything else is market-rate townhouses with no age restriction.
How the Five-Year Exemption Works
New Jersey's Five-Year Exemption and Abatement Law lets a town's ordinance treat a percentage of a newly built home's value, up to 30% of the assessor's full and true value, as if it didn't add to the property's value. That treatment lasts up to five years. The ordinance sets the yearly percentages and can use a different rate for each year. The NJ Division of Taxation notes that eligibility depends on the town having an authorizing ordinance, and that the E/A-1 application is due within 30 days of completion.
In practice, during the exemption years, a new age-restricted townhouse in Lumberton Village and a similar home without the exemption can carry different tax bills, even at similar prices. Once the window closes, that gap goes away. The sources reviewed don't show the exact percentage schedule that will apply to these units, so a first-year tax bill doesn't show what the bill will be once the exemption ends.
This affects resale too. Anyone selling an existing age-restricted or low-maintenance home in or near Lumberton could be compared against brand-new units with temporarily lower carrying costs. When those first five years are up, the comparison levels out.
The Supply Is Arriving Where Inventory Is Already Rising
Lumberton-only statistics from NJ REALTORS sit behind a member login. The most recent public numbers are Burlington County's, from the August 2026 Local Market Update, current as of September 9, 2026. County-wide, the two property types are heading in different directions:
| Burlington County, August 2026 | Single-family | Townhouse-condo |
|---|---|---|
| Median sales price | $455,000, down 0.9% | $312,500, down 8.6% |
| Closed sales | 351, down 0.6% | 103, down 8.8% |
| New listings | 391, up 8.0% | 129, up 16.2% |
| Inventory | 871, up 7.8% | 272, up 29.5% |
| Months of supply | 3.0, up 11.1% | 2.7, up 28.6% |
| Days on market | 31, down 6.1% | 33, up 17.9% |
| Percent of list price received | 101.2%, down 0.3% | 100.9%, unchanged |
All changes are compared with August 2025. Single-family homes in the county are holding steady. In the townhouse-condo segment, inventory, months of supply and days on market all rose far more than they did for single-family homes.
Lumberton Village's 685 market-rate townhouses come to about two and a half times the entire county's townhouse-condo inventory for sale in August 2026. No construction schedule or phasing has been announced, so nobody can say how quickly they'll reach the market. Still, for anyone weighing a townhouse in or near Lumberton, the trend in that segment is the number to watch. The single-family median says little about it.
There's a recent local example of a large project's timeline. Along Route 38, The Wexford opened in 2025 with 304 apartments, 262 market-rate and 42 affordable, as part of a community that also includes 90 single-family homes by Paparone and 70 affordable homes by the Walters Group, according to The Sun Newspapers. The land was bought in 2014, and The Sun describes a decade of redevelopment agreements and approvals before construction wrapped up. The builder now lists the single-family section, East Gate at Wexford, as sold out of homesites.
What the Agreement Gives Back to the Town
The deal is about more than housing units. The redeveloper plans to preserve roughly 220 acres at the corner of Eayrestown and Newbolds Corner Road by selling development rights through Burlington County's Farmland Preservation Program. That land must be farmed in perpetuity, including by any future owner. The documents give slightly different acreage figures. 70and73.com reported that the County Commission approved up to $3.73 million in June to preserve 226 acres at the southern end of the property, and the meeting summary cites 231 acres of open space.
The resolution also requires a $1,265,000 recreation payment, which works out to $2,500 for each of the 506 market-rate family townhomes. Each unit's share is due on or before the redeveloper requests that unit's certificate of occupancy, and the money is meant to help build a turf field at the municipal center. At the August meeting, the township solicitor said the turf field is just an idea with no plan or layout yet, and that the money has to go to recreation.
Traffic is part of the plan as well. A traffic light will go in at one of the project's two Eayrestown Road entrances. The developer's traffic consultant, Shropshire Associates, projects 449 trips in the weekday morning peak hour and 435 in the afternoon peak hour.
What Still Has to Happen
The township's Eayrestown Road Development page, last updated two days before the vote, lists these remaining steps:
- Complete the PILOT financial agreement, adopted by ordinance of the Township Committee. The page lists that as a future step.
- Update the plans to meet the board's conditions of approval.
- Get the required approvals from outside agencies. The page notes that NJDEP wetlands approval came August 28, 2026.
- Record the subdivision with the Burlington County Clerk.
No construction start date, sales launch or price points have been announced in the sources reviewed.
A Few Common Questions
Will every Lumberton Village home get a tax break? No. Under the August 6 resolution, the 179 age-restricted market-rate units get a five-year exemption, the 172 affordable units fall under a 30-year PILOT, and the resolution names no special arrangement for the 506 market-rate townhomes without age restrictions.
How much of Lumberton's housing does this add? 70and73.com estimates the project would increase the town's housing units by about 17%, based on a 2024 Census estimate of 5,036 units.
Is the five-year exemption the same everywhere in New Jersey? No. State law caps the new-construction exemption at 30% for up to five years, but each town's ordinance sets the actual schedule.
If you own a townhouse or a 55+ home in Lumberton, the homes your buyers compare against are about to change. At Ray Moorhouse Real Estate Group, we price against the segment your home actually sells in, and we're tracking every step of the Eayrestown Road project as it moves forward. Start with "What's My Home Worth?" and we'll walk you through the comps that apply to your property type.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
