Buying house next to trees

[yougotmeonspeedial]

Posting here unashamedly for traffic.

We are being given a large sum from family to help us move out of where we live - run down town where we see drug activity, and schools are in a sorry state.

The money is being gifted to help us get DC into a really good state secondary. But the area is very expensive and there’s not loads on the market, and we are average earners.

We made an offer on a house that clearly was a fixer upper, and the survey has brought up several extra issues- costly roof repairs that weren’t clear (awaiting formal estimates and possible re-negotiation with sellers), and the need for trees next to property to be maintained. It’s taken me weeks to get answers on these trees - and it’s apparent they are on unregistered land. We thought they formed part of the play park. No one is responsible for them. They are as close as 2-3 meters from the house, and whilst most are hazel (shallow roots) I think there’s a sycamore there too.

I think we should pull out. This house is going to stretch us - mortgage will be 25% of our income taking us right up to retirement age, with about £3000 a month left over before all other bills, do-able, but the idea was to downsize/ relocate in 10 years when schooling is done so that we don’t have to work beyond 70.

Having spoken to a tree surgeon I’m not worried these trees will damage the property in the immediate future- they are smaller trees and we’ve had surveys done to check drains etc are clear, but I’m very worried that they will make the house hard to sell in the future.

I’m very worried if we pull out now that we will end up in a long chain and miss the school application deadline (this oct).

Should I suck it up and accept the risk for the sake of my child’s education? Or try and find something somewhere else? we love the house and the area, but I’m loosing sleep over this (and yes, I’m very prone to anxiety and struggling to work out if it’s just me or not). Gift givers have made it clear that they think we should just get on with it and will be very disappointed if we take the money and move but don’t get a place.

YABU - crack on, it’ll be fine, you’ll sell
YANBU - find something else

This is what I was about to ask! If the trees and house have both been there a long time surely problems would have appeared by now.

I think if you are in a house long enough problems will appear no matter what, it might be the trees but it might not be. In each case you are going with your gut. I worry and look for issues (almost pulled out of my house because I was convinced I would die of radiation even though I lived 3 streets away already) but I don’t think the trees would be something to make me pull out.

We have willows and silver birches in a similar set up to you. The garden is lovely and private in the summer. My DH bought a garden hoover for the leaves - it keeps him occupied.

Our home insurance is more expensive but we also have a river within 30 feet but that's what we pay insurance for. If something like subsidence happens we are insured.
We just chop bits off when they start to come over the fence. DH took a 12ft branch off last week no one bothers.

I wouldn't buy the house because of the work, the roof etc and that you may find further problems you haven't allowed for in your budget - and further expense because of them. I am not you, though. How would you feel about that and would you be able to cope with it financially or otherwise?

Then there is the additional concern about the trees. You could look at the planning application for the house on your council's website database to see whether any measures were stipulated by the council, re root barriers and whether the building was signed off by building control etc.

You could also ask the council's tree officer about the trees and ownership and whether you'd need permission from the council to do anything to them.

If you want expert advice on possible threat from the trees and potential remedies to forestall any damage, you could commission a survey from an arboriculturalist - a qualified specialist in the science of trees and buildings and the risks of subsidence or ground heave.

The house insurance application form usually asks a question about whether you have any trees closer than a certain number of metres from the house.

Trees are not the reason to pull out.

So what are you worried about? You mention trees as a concern but then say the trees are not a worrying species. Therefore there is no concern re trees?

My concern is future sell-ability. But there is a lot to love about the house. South facing garden, not overlooked at all, next to a park, lovely big kitchen space, nice village. Like I said the mortage is a stretch taking us up to retirement age, which means unless one of us gets a big pay raise we won’t have as much money to enjoy/travel as we would if we stayed put. I can live with that if it means better school - but there’s no guarantee the kids will like the school even if on paper it looks better.

You would do if you've previously had subsidence from tree roots

It says 'pork'.

But subsidence hasn't been flagged as an issue in the survey. My garden has about 40 trees in it and none of them are an issue.

What type of soil is it on? Hazels are low water demand trees and generally don’t grow too large. Sycamores can grow to over 20m and are medium water demand.

The house was built well after the effects of trees on building foundations in clay soils was known and published on (BRE digests) so should shave even accounted for in the foundation design - you could have a trial pit dug to examine the footings.

Oink oink.

Do you know that the soils are clay. Trees don't cause the same issues in granular soils. Have a look on British geological survey website and see if there are any clay soils in the area. If you don't have clay, you are worrying about nothing.

But your tree surgeon said they aren't going to be an issue? What still concerns to the point of pulling out of the purchase?

Maps say loamy soils with high groundwater, but I’m not convinced maps are accurate - my current location says similar but my current garden is full of hard clay.

How old is the house. New build houses are generally constructed to deepen foundations for trees. Usually NHBC standards chapter 4.2 but depends on the warranty provider. This would require that the existing trees are considered when constructing the foundations. There is an app you can download to check what depth they need to be but it does vary depending on the plasticity of the soils, I guess you could ask the homeowner to dig a trial pit to verify that the foundations are deep enough but I'm not sure how happy they would be to do this.

@Steeryourselfanywaythatyouchoose

Trees and their roots can damage foundations of buildings and cause subsidence. Pressure from the growing roots can cause cracks in walls, as can the amount of water that trees draw from their environment.

This happened to a tenanted property we own. The trees were Oaks and were in the garden of a neighbouring property. We had trouble persuading that neighbour of the trouble they were causing, and that they would have to come down, though she did comply in the end.

25 years, so foundations would have been a lot deeper than older properties. I’ll look up the app thank you.

Yes absolutely, I'm aware of that, but the op said that she'd had a survey done and no problems had been identified. Also, the trees in question aren't ones that are likely to cause issues.

Oaks are one of the worst for subsidence issues as they drink so much - as you found out.

We have over 25 trees on our property and the original house was built in the 40s. Subsidence has never been a problem - the only time it came up was when we extended a few years ago and we had to do extra deep foundations because of the proximity of an oak and some conifers.

Trees can absolutely cause problems but it's certainly not a given and in this case, it sounds like the OP is worrying about nothing.

Have the trees reached nature height?

Do you know what type of soil is it (ie: sandy or clayey).

A mature tree in low plasticity soil won't be too problematic.

I don’t know, but I guess so. I’m struggling to establish what types they all are, most are hazel, one is something spikey so either sloe/ blackthorn/hawthorn and another I can’t work out at all - apps say elm, a tree ID group says plum.

My guess is they are all old hedgerow from where there was a field before the estate was built, but I can’t rule out anything planting itself there. I found sycamore leaves but no idea if they are from another nearby tree.

Meetimg with tree guy from council today to have a look - hoping they’ll let me get them professionally pruned, even if I pay for it. The tree surgeon advice (by phone, he’s not been to site yet) was that if we just prune up to our fence they might be destabilised- so we want to avoid that.

Soil is listed as loam with high water table.

If the house has been there for 25 years and not showing any damage, then I expect the foundations have been deepened. If the foundations haven't been deepened then I would expect damage to show in less than 25 years, especially if there is hawthorn as that is a high water demand tree. The only way to be more confident though is to dig a trial pit and see the foundation depth and to get plasticity index testing on some soil samples. Not usually things you do when you buy a house.

You could download google earth, the computer version not phone version. When you have that you can look back at historical aerial photos. You can draw a line around the house and look back in time to see how close the trees are and how old they are.

The only other thing I can think of is there is a company called satsence that uses satellite imaging and has historical data on ground movement and if they have a monitoring point on the house you can see if the house is moving. Again, not something that is usually done with domestic house purchase and no idea how much it costs to do this. It's pretty clever though.

Brilliant idea - yes I can see back to 2001 that the trees were mature then, so mature at the time the house was built

Really, I wouldn't worry. The trees seem to be in good condition, they will improve the air quality in your garden. Most people love trees. I've lived with old 80-footers in my garden. As they are my trees, I have a tree surgeon round every few years to give them the once-over and have had a couple lifted. It doesn't cost much. These aren't your trees, so are probably the responsibility of the council to maintain, but tbh, I'd see them as an asset, not a liability.

You can get permission to have work done on trees you don't own.
As they're alongside the park it's highly unlikely that a local authority is going to object to you having work done and I wouldn't be surprised if they own the trees but don't have records up to date re landownership