RUMSON — It was no sale for the Borough Council Tuesday night.
The council, prior to its regularly scheduled meeting this week, had planned to conduct an auction for two lots of borough owned property on Center Street.
But the proposed sale failed to elicit any bids.
“We were obviously more hopeful that we would have more interest,” Borough Administrator/Clerk Thomas Rogers said afterwards.
The two lots, 51 and 53 Center Street, are each approximately 50×150 feet in size. As formally advertised, borough officials had set the opening bid for $400,000 for each lot.
That price was in line with other similar sized lots were being sold for, Rogers explained.
“There was interest in the properties,” Rogers continued, explaining that 15 people had come to his office to pick up the sale packets, with one person signing up for the auction Tuesday evening.
The lots had been used for the borough police headquarters but police had relocated to the rebuilt municipal complex, 80 East River following the completion of that construction project in July 2009.
Given the lack of interest at this point, “We have to regroup and readvertise,” Rogers said, to announce another attempt to auction off the two lots.
The lots are zoned for residential use. And the proceeds of the sale would go toward the bond anticipation note used for the construction project.
At the time of project, officials said the work would cost approximately $6 million.
