For the first time since 2003, the median single-family home price in Bergen County fell below $400,000.

The state Treasury Department says Hackensack was the hardest-hit. Median home prices there dropped by 10 percent this year. Barbara Weismann, a real estate agent in Bergen County, says Hackensack has a large percentage of distressed properties and it's pulling all the prices in that town down.

Weismann believes the price on that house will go down below $200,000 next year. However, she says, in more affluent towns such as Tenafly, prices are stabilizing now and 2012 will be an improved market for sellers. She says there's a potential of a 1- or 2-percent appreciation in Tenafly and in comparable towns.