I have a neighbors whos tree leaves a bad mess in my back yard & pool. What are my legal rights?

Question

The tree is full of flowers during the summer & like bean pods during the Fall. It mmakes a mess out of my yard & clogs the drain of my pool daily. To keep up with my yard I have to clean it daily. I will clean it one day & the next morning wake up & it ooks like it did the day before. Its a beautiful tree but just is way to much of a problems.

Answer 1

Ask them to cut down the brush and branches over your side of the fence or take them to court to force them to cut it down.

Answer 2

Do what is Christian,be a good neighbor. The trees were there when you moved there. Some time it pays in the long run to clean up the leave in your yard and your neighbor will clean up the leaves in his yard. That said, If you can convince your neighbor that the both you and your neighbor's life would be better without  this tree. Offer to help him remove the tree and replace it with a more desirable tree.  However, if he is in love with this tree. "Do what is Christian, be a good neighbor.

Answer 3

Where I live, the law is that whatever your neighbor allows of his/her trees to grow over your property, the "fruits thereof that drop onto your property are YOURS to keep or destroy."  I believe that you have a strong case that would stand up in court if you feel that you have to sue your neighbor in order to make him/her trim back their tree(s) to the property line -- if he/she refused to respond to your more-than-one request.

Answer 4

Had the same problem.

You can legally cut right to the property line, but the breeze carried the leaves and flowers the extra couple of feet across the property line into the pool.

I tried the diplomatic approach. Then I started dumping all the leaves and debris that I cleaned out of the pool (about 3 5 gal buckets every couple of days) over the fence since they came from his tree. He finally got upset with me and came over to complain. I told him that I tried to handle it nicely but his tree is dumping in my pool causing damage.

We eventually agreed to split the cost of removing the trees. We both ended up happy and maybe we should have talked about this sooner. See if you might be able to work out a similar deal with your neighbor.

Answer 5

This is a tough one.  There is a difference between your legal rights and your ability to live peacefully with your neighbor.  You have the right to trim back any branch to the exact property line.   You own the space from the ground to the sky. All yours.  2 problems.  When i cut the branches, my neighbor started screaming like someone was dying.  I started to look around to see if i was missing something.  I stopped cutting.You can also cut any roots that pass across the property line.  But you are not supposed to kill the tree by doing it and you can't pour poison even tho the roots are on your property.

The neighbor owes it to you to trim it back.... a lot.

Answer 6

Trim whatever comes on your side and talk to your  neighbour about raking those leaves up.

Answer 7

Try to be diplomatic- approach the neighbor (kindly) and let him know how much of a burden his tree is on your life (and maintenance).  Some suggestions to 'mitigate' the situation are:

1. Ask him if he would agree to pay to have a professional tree company come in and properly prune (reduce) the tree in order to prevent overhead intrusion.   if "NO!", go to step2.

2.Offer to "chip-in" on this professional tree care service (we're only talking a few hundred dollars max.) if "No!", go to step 3.

3.Tell him you have tried to be both a reasonable man, and diplomatic and that now you will be hiring an UNPROFESSIONAL (mow n' blow) tree service to perform the unslighly task of HACK-IT-BACK to the property line so the guy literally has a half of a tree.  

Something tells me he'll go with option1, the tree will be reduced, reformed and everyone will be happy.

until next year.....

Answer 8

Invite your neighbor over for a swim,,,,,AFTER he helps you clean up the pool....!