Mike Rice is in urgent need of real estate advice

Tom Canavan from the Associated Press reports that Coach Rice is currently residing at a local hotel.

Home, for now, is a nearby hotel.

His wife and children are still living in western Pennsylvania, near Robert Morris, although he expects them to buy a home near his wife's family in Monmouth County.

Don't do it, man. That morning commute can be a killer. He'll regret it first time driving through Rt. 18. The Rutgers football head coaches used to live only one town over, but even that proved to be too far away.

From time to time, one amusing curiosity can be looking through the New Jersey forum at City-Data.com. It seems like very much a microcosm of the N.J. suburban mentality, with every poster obsessed with property tax rates, SAT scores, commutes, and walkable downtowns. It's one of those sites where you get sucked in for a while every so often, then feel like you need a shower afterwards upon realizing that the argument for Cranford's superiority to Metuchen is unassailable.

There's a tradeoff with exurbs. New Jerseyans know that most of the area around the Watchung Mountains is beautiful, but supply and demand mean that prices tend to rise the closer you get to New York City. (South Jersey might as well be another state in that respect. I definitely understand the incentives to colonize down there or Eastern Pennsylvania) There just isn't enough of the state to go around, which any glance at the rapid pace of development will confirm. Eventually we're just going to have to raze every inch of farmland or move back into cities, I guess. It's not like there's much of a choice.