Lesson Learned: Don't Forget the Cost of Trees

[David Light]

$800 of unplanned tree trimming and removal later, I learned to not forget the trees. The first house we acquired was in a new development with no trees so I never thought about the cost of maintaining them. However, the next two houses we bought have trees, BIG trees. They're in a well established neighbourhood and the trees make it nice but we overlooked the cost of trimming them when buying the houses. We recently visited the homes and it was glaringly obvious they needed trimming in a bad way and one of them was actually dead and at risk of falling on the house. A quick phone call and it was all taken care of as an unplanned expense. Not a huge deal but we could have taken care of it when buying the house and planned for the expense, potentially at a lower cost. So I wanted to share my lesson with everyone else. Don't forget the trees!