No Respect
 

So we just sold the property we live on to a developer. We had three lots in a small older neighborhood - on a dead end, our house on the middle lot. One side was mostly cleared and graded long ago, and was a nice big yard with a peach tree and a pear tree, and two big paper-shell pecan trees. The other side was hilly and wild, full of soaring old oak trees, with lots of dogwoods, wild roses, and blackberries, a little spot of suburban forest.

We negotiated to stay here a few weeks post-sale. We knew that the buyer's plans were to build a house on each side lot, and that he'd begin the work on the side lots while we were still here. But nothing could have prepared me for the way I felt when I heard the huge pecan tree fall to the ground. They are basically trimming all the trees way back, topping them, and pulling them over. And today I drove up to see the other side nearly cleared, only the trimmed back and shortened trunk of one oak tree still standing.

I called this post "No Respect" because while I understand the process of development, and am responsible for my decision to sell the land to a developer, I just found it shocking how brutal this process is. It's possible to put homes into wooded areas and preserve old-growth trees if one has a mind to - a way to build with some some respect for the land. This guy's approach is so disrespectful, it hurts. Clear, scrape and go. We joke that he'll have the house on the right side finished when we get home from work tomorrow!

Yeah, I know it's all about dollars. I just had really not thought it through and prepared myself for the brutality of how it would unfold.

Shall I update tomorrow to show the empty space where the remains of the oak are standing now?
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I just barely caught the biggest pecan tree in the left of the first frame. I was hardly back in the house five minutes when I heard it go...

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dopey bastards.

I am always puzzled why developers will take wooded land, cut down every last tree and twig, build their houses, and then plant puny little saplings.

I can understand it if they are putting up a dense neighborhood of over-sized houses jammed together with no room for anything but a sapling.

But if they are building normal size houses on normal size lots, why not leave some big healthy trees and build around them? The trees will add value to the finished homes.

If you are ever in the position to sell lots or land again, put language in the contract regarding preserving portions of the land..

Codocils?

I think codicils go with wills and trusts. Maybe a covenant. Regardless, hindsight is 20/20. Our new place is in the city, and it has so little land around it, the only tree is an old dogwood in the front yard. But it's a big beautiful dogwood :)

Does the "developer" own those houses across the street? If so... or even if not, he's probably trying to make these two lots look more like those.

I detest that kind of "mow everything down and slap it up development" and will never live in one. Those guys are taking down trees that look like they don't need to remove... the ones near the property line. Ugh. Maybe they're thinking about possible future storm damage to the homes.

In today's mindless market, so many people just want a certain layout and size and couldn't care less about the fact there are no trees. Part of it is probably that we live in such a changeable/mobile society. I don't know what the stats are of how long the average person/family stays in a home, but I think it's less than 10 years.

I wouldn't even want to live 2 years in a house on one of those scalped lots. So many of today's newer homes look like a garage with a house built on the back of it... like those across the street. I understand why that layout is efficient, space-wise, but it's butt ugly, IMO.

One reason I've heard so many developers go in gangbusters and rip everything out is that when grading the lots, even if they made the effort to leave as many trees as possible, sometimes the ground is graded a bit too low or too high at the base of the tree, and it ends up dying in a few years anyway. That happened here in a newish development on the edge of town where some friends moved a few years ago... many residents lost several trees in their yard.

But over half the trees survived, and that neighborhood never looked half as bad as the scalp jobs that have been going up in the last 10-15 years.

Don't be surprised if they scalp your lot after you move out.

OMG!
What crap.
Doesn't the developer realize that the person that built your house already knocked down some trees to build IT?; and now this..... well, this is just toooo much.
;)

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Read the book, Buy it by the acre, Sell it by the foot.
It will explain alot about development. :rolleyes:

My dad went out of his way to build around trees. He built a community in Oregon. The town was against builders in general, but really did not care for builders from out of state.... By the time the property was developed, the town loved my dad and his partner. It can go both ways. :)

Somewhat related - in Malibu, a homeowner was absolutely positive a boulder lodged in a hillside would one day fall, skip over the Pacific Coast Highway and crash in his house. So, being the well-to-do beachfront homeowner that he was, he mustered enough of his own influence to actually have the boulder blasted out of the mountain. As a consequence, other pieces of hillside, including boulders, dislodged and rolled down the hill. As of now, a very ugly retaining wall juts out into the highway to keep the boulders that do fall from crashing into homes.

That's Mother Nature for you.

Cutting down and removal of trees can upset the topography - at least I would think - and cause the land to shift. Does it flood where you are in AL? If so, this new owner may have problems, just like those residences have problems with falling boulders.

Here in L.A., every tree is precious because they help clean our polluted air. There in fact should be a law against cutting them down, IMO.

BECAUSE...if you merely thin old growth forest, you are removing a kind of built in wind protection. I'm not sure if this holds with all types of trees, but with Douglas fir? Leave 3 or 4 trees surrounding the house while cutting others away, and you will see them ON the house in the first severe wind storm.

The developer does own about 50% of the houses on this street, but not the ones across the street. Those houses have no trees in front, but massive old-growth elms behind them. I don't know of any plans for development across the street.

As for the rest of the trees on this house lot, the grading guy drove by when I was out last night taking pictures of the destruction. He came by in a van with his wife & baby to see if his men had finished whatever they were supposed to. I was all misty talking to him about how sad it was to see the trees go.

He'd laughed at me the day before when the pecan went down because I ran out with my camera, stood mouth agape staring at the toppled pecan, fired up my camera and took some video saying, "I'm sorry tree! Thanks for all the years of delicious pecans, and for shading the house. I'm sorry the builder couldn't be bothered to find a place for you in his building plan!"

Anyway I asked him about the other pecan, and some of the smaller oaks and pines left around the edge of the formerly-forested lot. He said everything that was going was gone - except the remains of that oak which would come down today. No plans to remove any other (of the five remaining) trees.

Like you, I have never given a second look at those scrape-and-go cookie-cutter neighborhoods. The new place in the city has fewer trees on our actual lot, but the neighborhood is full of beautiful old-growth trees, and there are little parks everywhere.

Wish I'd thought to see if there was a tree ordinance around here. I doubt it but I will check and see just because. When I built my first house, it was in one of those huge neighborhoods, but a different builder built my house, and we were able to walk the lot and select the trees we wanted preserved.

After the developers rip out every tree, they'll call the development "Forrest Grove", "Wooded Acres" or some such nonsense...

Men **** where they eat.

My parents moved into a house way, way outside of town in the middle of no where. One side of the street is small lots with mostly trailer homes. The other side of the street is lots that are mostly 4-5 acres. That's where my parents' house is. The folks that built the house did exactly that, had the house built with minimal trees removed. For years my parents couldn't grow grass because of the shade from the oak trees. My dad passed away a few years back. She's had a few trees removed that were damaged by hurricanes so she's got a little grass now. When you're walking in the cleared area around the house, there's only 2 places where you can see the property line because of the trees and forest. Fortunately both side lots are also natural so she is isolated in her own little forest. You can't even see the end of the driveway because it's at an angle in the corner. It's pretty nice. It sounds like you were in a beautiful spot. Now you need to find another.

You SOLD the property

The point of my post was to say how unexpectedly sad it's been to see the trees go down on the property I SAID I SOLD.

What was the point of your post?

It's the old saying that a developer tears out all the trees and then names the streets after them.

I have a 100 year old oak in my back yard that the developer built around. I love that old tree. My west highland terrier actually climbs it to get a better look at the cat in the next yard!!! Never saw a dog climb like that.

Anyway, I'm grateful to have that tree and it adds a lot to our property.

The point of my post is simply, "you sold your rights to the property" so why fret or complain.

It's not yours anymore, you got your money so just move on. If the tree's were that big of a concern then you should have included stipulations in the contract.

Suburbia: where they cut down the trees and name the streets after them.

I see developments in my travels that are not new anymore. I remeber them being built in the 80's. Still not a tree in sight. No shade, burnt lawns. A/C units must be running full tilt.

The best time to plant a tree? 50 years ago. The next best time? Today.