So, things I have shared so far:
- My son is renting our house with 2 years left to make a decision as to whether they want to move or buy.
- My property has forsythia as property boundaries/privacy screens. The privacy screens really were mainly useful for privacy between our house and the house next door. The other two sides of our home are bound by a public park and provide a sense of spaciousness and a lovely view of a beautiful, treed park.
- Two years ago I came home to our NJ home to find that our new neighbors (they bought the house that was previously my BIL/MIL's house) had literally chopped the forsythias in half because apparently they objected to the branches hanging over their property. However, they never expressed this to us.
So, now my son is just closing out Year #1 on the rental agreement. He advised us that the forsythias are basically dead and the landscaper suggested that we remove them. My son and DIL understandably want some privacy between these two homes, so they got a quote for removing the nearly dead forsythia and replacing with some type of evergreen, like arbor vitae, to provide privacy. The bill for that would be $3800. They would actually prefer a fence. A fence, for their purposes, really only needs to run along one side of the yard--the part between our house and the neighbors.
What would you do? Here are the issues at play:
- I don't know how long my son will be there. Could be anywhere from about 3-4 months to forever.
- I'm not sure if the fence would pay for itself if they move and we put the house on the market
- If I got a fence, would the house be more marketable with a fence that surrounds the back yard? I hate to do that because the veiw of the park is beautiful.
- What, if anything, do I communicate to the neighbors? I suspect nothing, because I said nothing when they originally hacked the bushes to pieces, but is there any benefit to letting them know what boundaries are? And their actions cost us a bundle?
What would you do?