Borough of Belmar v. 201 16th Ave., Belmar

McGANN, J.S.C.,

retired and temporarily assigned on recall.

Where a bank lends money for the purchase of commercial property, which derives its value as a rooming house permitted as a nonconforming use in a residential zone, after abandonment of that use by the owner, does the mortgagee bank nonetheless possess an independent right to assert that the purchaser at the bank’s foreclosure sale takes title with the benefit of this valid nonconforming use status? That is the question posed here. There appears to have been no prior judicial ruling on that issue.

The essential facts are not in dispute.…