Removing trees in shared gardens cheaply and getting neighbours to contribute

spaceraiders · 29 June 2009 at 7:22AM

Hi,

I live in a ground floor flat that looks onto shared gardens. In our shared garden there are 3 trees (reaching to about the 2nd floor). In the next door shared garden, there is a huge tree (over 4 floors high). These trees block out all the light to the gardens and back windows so it's like living in a cave at the moment for me and a few others.

I want to get all the trees cut down. So far, I've had a quote for £700 just to take down the huge tree. This includes removal of the wood. I've managed to get permission from the majority of the 16 (!) homeowners from next door to allow this.

I'm going to get some quotes for the trees in our garden next. The problem is I'm having a hard time approaching people to contribute to the cost. I'm just not sure what the best way to do it is. Asking face to face seems cheeky and by letter seems ineffective.

Most people in both flats seem indifferent about the garden. Next door, 8 of the flats do not face the gardens. The landlords aren't interested in the garden as they've already got tenants.

I'm thinking I could get all the trees down for about £1000 but I'll be pretty annoyed having to pay it all myself seeing as it's something that clearly needs to be done.

Two things:

- Does anyone have any tips about getting donations from neighbours to help a shared problem? I was going to phone each and ask for £30 or so and say I would make up the rest of the money, but only if I get enough donations.

- Does anyone have any tips for getting rid of trees cheaply? The high cost appears to be because the garden is via a flat door, so it's hard to get the wood out. I've heard about places offering to pick up firewood. Should I maybe look at chopping down the smaller trees myself and getting rid of the wood via freecycle or something else. It'll probably be a lot of wood.

Ugh, I really want rid of the trees soon but organising all this and the cost is really frustrating.

Thanks.

silvercar · 29 June 2009 at 9:58AM

Your problem is getting agreement. Getting permission from the majority of owners is not good enough. You need the permission of everyone who part owns the tree. In the case of flats, I would imagine that means the freeholder.

gmgmgm · 29 June 2009 at 10:11AM

"Most people in both flats seem indifferent about the garden. Next door, 8 of the flats do not face the gardens."
"something that clearly needs to be done"

Your problem seems to be that it's NOT clearly something that needs to be done. It seems to be only you feeling strongly about it.

Maybe a compromise would be better: why not get a tree surgeon to prune the tree to give you a little more light. Much cheaper and you will still end up with a good tree in the garden.

Trees take many many years to grow and are good things to have: don't be too hasty to just chop them all down.

Doozergirl · 29 June 2009 at 10:11AM

Our neigbour spoke to the parks department and they sent out one of those chipping things for £100 - it was about 10 lleylandii they got removed for that. They'd bought one skip and that barely fitted one tree in for £100.

We just took a tree down - our gardener costs £15 and hour, cost £40. We chopped it up really small and H has done a million trips to the tip.

ormus · 29 June 2009 at 10:14AM

getting them all to agree and pay up is a big problem. if you cut the problem in half. ie you pay the bill, you may get an agreement much easier.
after the evil deed is done, then you might get donations after they all see the benefit/s
at the end of the day, if the tree annoys you that much, you will pay out willingly.
break the bill down into smaller bits. ie live 20 years at the flat and it comes to a pound per week.

27col · 29 June 2009 at 1:10PM

When I wanted a couple of large trees taken out, the tree surgeon contacted the Council to make sure that there was not a tree preservation order on the trees concerned.
If there is, in your case, you may not get permission anyway. I believe that there can be quite severe fines for damaging TPO trees. Just a thought to ponder.

spaceraiders · 29 June 2009 at 5:01PM

Thanks for the replies. Some answers to questions:

- I've checked with the council and there is no preservation order.
- What's a freeholder? I asked the council and they said permission from the majority of the homeowners was sufficient. Who else would I need permission from?
- I probably wasn't clear in my message. There's essentially a half circle of trees covering the backs of two flats. It's so dark you have to have lights on at all times and it's cold even when the sun is out. No sun gets through. No-one in their right mind would appreciate these trees. One tree grows to the 3rd floor and is about 2 meters from the windows. The gardens are completely neglected; there are shopping trolleys, old doors, rubbish etc. just sitting in the gardens. Several people I spoke to hate the gardens and the lack of light but just don't seem to want to organise things.

Doozergirl
"Our neigbour spoke to the parks department and they sent out one of those chipping things for £100 - it was about 10 lleylandii they got removed for that. They'd bought one skip and that barely fitted one tree in for £100."
How big were the trees? One tree is huge. It would be dangerous for me to try to cut it down I think. I've considered cutting the others down myself though.

Doozergirl · 29 June 2009 at 9:09PM

spaceraiders wrote: »

Doozergirl
"Our neigbour spoke to the parks department and they sent out one of those chipping things for £100 - it was about 10 lleylandii they got removed for that. They'd bought one skip and that barely fitted one tree in for £100."
How big were the trees? One tree is huge. It would be dangerous for me to try to cut it down I think. I've considered cutting the others down myself though.

As big as a house. We didn't cut ours down ourselves, my H helped our gardener who is a professional groundsman. He felled trees as a kid even.

The neighbours however got very happy themselves with a chainsaw. I have five neighbours that I didn't know I had last year. :rolleyes:

silvercar · 29 June 2009 at 10:27PM

A freeholder owns the block ie the building. Certainly in England and Wales, the indivdual "flat owners" will actually be leaseholders, granted 99 or even 999 year leases to occupy their flats.

The freeholder is responsible for maintenance of the building and generally each leaseholder pays a service charge to cover their share of the costs.

In very small blocks you can have one of the flat owners also owning the freehold. Common on conversions.

You can also have all the flat owners owning a share of the freehold and electing a management company between then to manage the block. You would still have a service charge with this set up.

spaceraiders · 29 June 2009 at 11:02PM

silvercar wrote: »

A freeholder owns the block ie the building. Certainly in England and Wales, the indivdual "flat owners" will actually be leaseholders, granted 99 or even 999 year leases to occupy their flats.

The freeholder is responsible for maintenance of the building and generally each leaseholder pays a service charge to cover their share of the costs.

In very small blocks you can have one of the flat owners also owning the freehold. Common on conversions.

You can also have all the flat owners owning a share of the freehold and electing a management company between then to manage the block. You would still have a service charge with this set up.

Thanks. I'm in Scotland. I did a quick search and it doesn't appear to apply here.

spaceraiders · 29 June 2009 at 11:05PM

Doozergirl wrote: »

As big as a house. We didn't cut ours down ourselves, my H helped our gardener who is a professional groundsman. He felled trees as a kid even.

The neighbours however got very happy themselves with a chainsaw. I have five neighbours that I didn't know I had last year. :rolleyes:

The problem is the big tree is within 10 meters of houses and the fences are very short. It would have to be scaled and cut down in pieces I think.

By the way, when you said the skip barely fitted 1 tree, did it not end up costing you a lot of money because you had to get several skips?

I'm still not sure what options I have. I could pay £600/700 to get the big tree down then do the others myself perhaps.

Removing trees in shared gardens cheaply and getting neighbours to contribute

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