 <p>You don't have to save the modified object.</p> <p>Once setProperty has been called, your node property has been set in the current Transaction.</p> <p>The only thing you are missing here is to close the Transaction, check this (from <a href="http://neo4j.com/docs/stable/javadocs/" rel="nofollow">Neo4j Javadoc</a>) about <code>Transaction.close()</code>:</p> <blockquote> <p>Commits or marks this transaction for rollback, depending on whether success() or failure() has been previously invoked. All ResourceIterables that where returned from operations executed inside this transaction will be automatically closed by this method. This method comes from AutoCloseable so that a Transaction can participate in try-with-resource statements. It will not throw any declared exception. Invoking this method (which is unnecessary when in try-with-resource statement) or finish() has the exact same effect.</p> </blockquote>