Tenants ringbarked trees

When I purchased my IP nearly 12 months ago, I planted 13 fruit trees in the back yard because one day I plan to live there. Hence a couple years would pass and the trees would grow.

To my disappointment, when I attended the property recently to attend to some maintenance, I found at 10 of the 13 trees have had the bark destroyed with a whipper snipper around the base of the tree. So basically all 10 trees have been killed.

My agent has advised me that the tenants are not gardeners and are not liable for the damage. If taken to the tribunal, they would rule that the tenant is only required to mow the lawn and do basic weeding. She also said the trees should have had bark spread around them to stop the lawn growing so close.

The thing is the bark was placed there, but the grass was let to grow around.

Has anyone got experience in a similar situation? Am I just supposed to wear the cost? do i replant or just leave it?

Do I have to fence off all the vegetation on the property?
 
I'm afraid you can't get attached to anything in your IP - it is simply a business tool - including the vegetation. The only real function of the vegetation in an IP is to attract/retain tenants..... as long as they are "generally maintaining" (i.e. mowing the lawn - I am not even sure about the weeding bit) it, there is not much you can enforce (for instance, you might fence it off, but can you force them to water it - especially given water restrictions?)

Plan to replant when you move in :) - or start growing in a pot now, so you can transplant.

Cheers,

The Y-man
 
Has anyone got experience in a similar situation? Am I just supposed to wear the cost?
Yep
do i replant or just leave it?
Just leave it
Do I have to fence off all the vegetation on the property?
If you want it to live, yes, and get your own gardener.


I know how you feel, I have some places with very well established (probably 50 year old) Tahitian limes, Lychees, mangoes, lemons , Pecan Nuts and when we purchased the properties they were loaded with fruit, lush and green and tropical.

One of these places was like a small botanical garden with hundreds of Bromiliads and other exotic flowery things and was a natural corridor for wildlife in the area.

Now we could have chopped it all down and built several units on the site but we reduced the numbers to 3 small lot houses saved the trees and kept the gardens intact so as tenants and animals could still enjoy the fruits and outlook

Now they are a shadow of their former self, bromiliades have all dissapeared ($8 each at the markets?) very sad indeed

Tenants don't seem to care and treat the fruit and wildlife that was attracted to it all as an imposition.

But then we have another tenant at another property that has been with us for a few years who has greatly improved the block added security screens to the front and back doors of the house at his expense and keeps the place just immaculate.

A definite keeper he be.

Dave
 
Hi crc

It's disappointing when things go wrong / get damaged / die, but property investing is not about the emotional side, it is simply about the practical side.

About ten years ago I built an exec house for rent, spent blistering days watering in $500 worth of native plants, grass seed etc

When those (professional) tenants moved out (across the road, as it turned out, to their own house) there was fewer than a half dozen plants alive in my garden, and the lawns were a mass of runner grass.

Their garden is a delight - roses, greenery - and mine was left dead.

Every tenant in that house has always said how much they 'love gardening'. Everyone of them has killed off the plants I have replaced the original plants with.

Now, it is all tea trees, plectranthus, and roses. The plectranthus looks awful if it's not watered frequently but comes back after a bit of rain. Roses are briars and tea trees couldn't care less.

It all comes out in the wash. Don't upset yourself, but if you want fruit trees Y-man has the idea - establish them in large tubs and transplant them as bare-rooted trees in winter when you move in.

Remember: The best word a Landlord can learn in 'Bugger!' and the best thing you can learn to do is to just get on with it.

Unfortunate, but true.

Cheers
Kristine
 
The neighbour to my IP admitted he'd dug out a cycad I had been growing there for the last 15 years...I asked him why..he said it had died...

When I last saw it it looked liked this (though I had transplanted it to move it away from a garden path)

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Cycad-Very-L...3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66:2|65:1|39:1|240:1318

This guy doesn't work...grows veggies on his plot of dirt at his inner city terrace and looks after his very aged mother.

That sort of thing p*sses me off...it takes quite a bit of digging to remove a large sized cycad...not sure why he'd go to the trouble...reckon he dug it out and sold it...but I can't prove it.

Moral of the story is you shouldn't grow attached to plants/trees at your IP...if its not tied down it will disappear..if its growing someone will kill it or remove it.
 
so lets get this clear, the tenant can psychically damage vegetation on the property, and not be liable for it?

A landlord's treasure could be another persons weed.... (hmm..... ok, that doesn't sound right - have had tenant growing "weed" in the IP complete with hydroponics and lights...)

The "value" of vegetation is very subjective - for instance I have some non-descriptive shrubs in my yard at home - the previous owner had planted them I presume.

I took very little (ok, "no") care of them - until I saw some at a nursery - and they were like $100 (for a much smaller specimen) :eek: Funny how I started watering them after that :D

At the end of the day, ask yourself this: would the property's valuation change dramtically whether you had fruit trees, or a wattle, or just a plain patch of lawn, or even an expanse of concrete (actually this last one might).... or can you claim depreciation on "plants" (of the vegetative sort)?



Cheers,

The Y-man
 
I sure wish Boat Boy had been my LL 19 years ago. We rented one side of a duplex. Had trouble with a prowler. Hubby installed brand new security doors at our expense,(nice decorative steel ones with colonial lace insert panels in keeping with style of house) worth $350 each back then, to both dwellings.( the other dwelling was LL's holiday house) but :eek: he neglected to ask for permission :eek: :eek: and the LL insisted we remove them!

I know hubby should have asked if it was okay to add value improvements but I never honestly understood why LL knocked back the gesture. Sold them for $40 each in a garage sale in the end!
 
sounds like fair wear and tear. You can't expect tenants to not be morons and the right to moronic behaviour is upheld by the courts. Suck it up and think of the big picutre... whatever that is.
 
All the stories here about the lack of care. I didn't expect the trees to be watered or cared for.

What my point is that they destroyed the trees by ring barking them.

This isn't a maintenance issue, but its a damage caused issue.

If they rip a hole into your wall in a bedroom with a vacuum cleaner, do they claim that they are not builders or cleaners and are not liable for the damage?

I let a property in a certain condition, and any damage done by them, either deliberate or due to ignorance, should be the tenants problem. You break a window, you replace it, you drive over a dree and knock it down, you pay for it, you get a chainsaw and cut down a tree without permission, you pay for it.. I don't see why vegetation damage should be an exception.

Sure I don't expect the tenant to paint the house and maintenance it, just like I don't expect them to maintain the garden.
 
sounds like fair wear and tear. You can't expect tenants to not be morons and the right to moronic behaviour is upheld by the courts. Suck it up and think of the big picutre... whatever that is.

so a tenant can get a chain saw and cut down trees in your property without your permission?
 
I honestly don't expect anything from tenants other than for them to not oblige their side of the deal and generally cost me a lot of money. The majority of them are idiots that are obvioulsy renting because they don't have the capability to buy a house. Having such people as the cornerstone of my wealth creation program is a scary prospect.
 
I am sorry to hear that they cut down your fruit trees. I can understand your frustration.
If I was renting a place with fruit trees I would be really happy because I am really into organics and I am a greeny.
I agree though about tenants, sometimes you get some who are perfect and really look after the place, other times it is constant monitoring that is required and you just have to go "bugger". I am learning that myself renting rooms in my PPOR.
I am building up a nice garden in my PPOR which when it becomes an IP I expect the worst. If someone looks after it that is a bonus and I hope they do, but I expect the worse and in the meantime it is my hobby to make a nice garden.
They destroyed the trees by accident trying to do some gardening. If they cut them down. I.e. intentionally removed them I reckon you would have a case for keeping their bond.
 
so a tenant can get a chain saw and cut down trees in your property without your permission?
Sadly, crc_error, probably they can, yes.
They destroyed the trees by accident trying to do some gardening. If they cut them down. I.e. intentionally removed them I reckon you would have a case for keeping their bond.
I doubt that even if you had video footage of them deliberately destroying the tree, you'd be able to keep any bond. If there's even a hint that it was due to accidental damage or neglect, the tenants won't be found responsible. With regards to removal/destruction, they'd just claim that it was infected or something (borers etc), and they didn't want it to spread to your other trees.

I'm a gardener, and I found all this out the hard way, too, when we put in a lot of work on a former PPOR and let it out as an IP. I feel for you, but I'm quite sure that you have no legal recourse with regards to any vegetation.

Nurture your own garden, and make your IP garden as hardy as possible.
 
thanks guys.

So why is damage to the psychical house considered different to damage to the garden?

Tenants are not allowed to put a nail in the wall for paintings, yet are allowed to cut trees, damage trees etc... as I said, I'm not talking about watering the garden, i'm talking about actual damage to trees?
 
I honestly don't expect anything from tenants other than for them to not oblige their side of the deal and generally cost me a lot of money. The majority of them are idiots that are obvioulsy renting because they don't have the capability to buy a house. Having such people as the cornerstone of my wealth creation program is a scary prospect.

I really find this attitude perplexing. If you feel this way, why bother with residential IPs. Just sell them and find something you are happier with.

We have had a handful of crook tenants, but mostly they are just people who need or want to rent for whatever reason. They are not all "idiots" and most of our tenants are capable of buying a house (and several already have IPs).

We have only ever had one tenant "trash" the place and that was to the tune of under $3K which insurance covered. Some leave it less clean than I would hope, but mostly they do the right thing.

Perhaps it is the houses you are renting that is the problem, rather than the tenants.
 
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