If he wants the $700 up front and says he'll do the job tomorrow, tell him to GTF off your property immediately.

I paid $650 last year to have a partially dead tree hanging over the house to be cut down but I told them I’d do the cleanup so I could use it for firewood. So no stump grinding either. $700 sounds like a hell of a deal. Looking at the picture though doesn’t appear to be a too difficult job.

I paid $800 two years ago and it was a kinfolk deal . He had to use a crane and reach over my house to swing the pieces over and lower them down . Cut up and hauled away . $700 is a steal IF he is insured .

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:

Hell, even I could have predicted that would happen

quote:

Originally posted by YellowJacket:
This is definitely true but the tree guys should be able to rope the tree off to it's neighbor and keep it from swinging toward the house.

Then it comes down unexpectedly, pivots on the rope, the bottom comes around and takes out the fence.

We've had <counting...> four trees taken down in the yard, and another out back in the woods. None of them were even remotely as close to endangering nearby trees or structures as that tree is. None of them were just flopped.

I've done a fair amount of smaller tree work, myself.

Live wood doesn't always behave the way you plan and expect it will. Tree pros know this.

Anybody that came out to quote that job that I haven't worked with before I'd ask how they planned to do it. If they told me they were just gonna flop it to <there>, I'd thank them for their time and tell them I was awaiting a couple more quotes. They wouldn't hear back from me.

Thanks for the insights, all.
Definitely some things I hadn't considered.

Prior to this coming up, I'd thought about trimming it back, best I could, to minimize falling debris from any further wind incursions.
Would depend on my ability to get a ladder on the neighboring tree & use an extendo-saw to trim it back.

I'd take that down myself and save the money, but I do have experience with felling trees all my life.

I'd have a pull vehicle to pull it the direction I'd want it to fall, and have ropes rigged to prevent it swinging to one side or the other (as alluded to in a previous post). This method has worked perfectly in the past for me in very tight quarters around my house.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
Thanks for the insights, all.
Definitely some things I hadn't considered.

Prior to this coming up, I'd thought about trimming it back, best I could, to minimize falling debris from any further wind incursions.

Ok, well, here's another thing to consider: Homeowners insurance may not cover you if that tree falls on your home and the insurance company determines you should have reasonably known that tree was a danger and you failed to address it.

quote:

Homeowners insurance is designed to cover sudden accidents and other events beyond your control, so it does not help you pay for damage you can or should have addressed through the normal course of owning your home. This includes events caused or exacerbated by negligence on your part. For example, if you do not adequately trim a tree on your property and a falling limb damages the roof of your house, you would not be covered.

Ref: What Homeowners Insurance Doesn't Cover

A friend discovered this the hard way. He'd had an ice dam on the roof one winter. Interior wall was water-damaged. The insurance company covered it. Now he knew there was an issue. He failed to address it. It happened again. Insurance company told him to go fish.

$200 TO Knock it down. Then you deal with it. Done deal. Should be a 15 min. job to take it down.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
Thanks for the insights, all.
Definitely some things I hadn't considered.

Prior to this coming up, I'd thought about trimming it back, best I could, to minimize falling debris from any further wind incursions.
Would depend on my ability to get a ladder on the neighboring tree & use an extendo-saw to trim it back.

Yeah, definitely wanting to avoid that.

I’ve had about 23 trees cut down (ash borer—thanks China). Depends on whether they have to climb it and top it first. If all they have to do is drop it and haul it away, shouldn’t be more than $500. If they have to climb, then $1k+.

Do a google search of tree companies in your area and read the reviews carefully. Those with the best reputation usually have insurance and long experience. This is not an area where you want to go with someone who knocks on your front door. Important that company carries insurance, especially if one of their employees is injured removing your tree on your property. Professional tree removal companies are not inexpensive. I have had trees removed here in SC as well as my former home in Virginia.

Had a small oak taken down recently, maybe just a hair bigger than the pic in the OP. Stump cut level with the ground, but not ground out. Wood cut into fireplace length and left, branches removed from site. Kind of a difficult location, had to be pieced down rather than felled. $600 all in. You will find, if you get estimates, that prices will be all over the place, perhaps driven more by how busy/backed up the tree guy is than the labor hours involved. Licensed/insured is important, do not rely on your homeowner's insurance for this kind of thing. Worst case, tree guy's worker hurt/killed on the job, who's going to pay?

I own a tree service in Maryland. I would not just drop that tree since it is so close to the house. The other tree being so close might affect the way it wants to fall. We are licensed and insured. I would charge $1,200.00 - 1,500.00 to remove the tree and grind the stump. It is very difficult to give an accurate price from one picture.

And there you have it ^^^^^

(Coincidentally: Given what I'd seen in the OP's photo, and our own experiences, $1200 to $1500 was my guess. Hell, the tree we had taken down in the woods was $700, and they just dropped the bits in-place and left 'em there.)

I bet fritz would be happy to drop by when he has a little spare time and do the deed for ya.

I had three trees removed about a year ago. About $8k. One was much bigger and very dead. 6 guys, a chipper and truck, and a crane. Licensed and insured both liability and workers comp. A deal is great until some knucklehead drops a tree on your house or himself or falls out of it. The professional a few posts above gave a rate for what he would charge that seems in line with professional work and all that it entails.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
I’m immediately leery of any service that knocks on my doors.

That was my first reaction.

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
I’m immediately leery of any service that knocks on my doors.

That was my first reaction.

If they have to go out and find work, what does that tell you about them?

All the reputable tree companies around here are booked out weeks and even months with work, they don’t need to go pounding the pavement and knocking on doors.

My parents just had one of the biggest local tree services out this morning. They removed a redwood that had died due to a pool leak (chlorine poisoning) that was substantially taller than the tree pictured in the OP and located directly next to a fence.

They also manually climbed a HUGE avocado tree an thinned it out some.

$900 for everything and it was fast. They rolled in with a truck with a boom arm that grabbed the redwood, starting from the top, and took off maybe 10 feet at a time. The boom arm carried the log section down to the ground safely. No felling required.

They cut it into 18" long rounds, as requested, and left it neatly piled. My parents opted to leave a bit of a stump for some aesthetic reason I didn't understand, so that saved labor.

All in all it was much cheaper than I expected. A good experience.