Level set my outsource yard maintenance expectations
April 30, 2018 11:42 AM Subscribe
I'm paying for my yard maintenance for the first time in my life and it feels like what I'm getting doesn't come close to what I'm paying for, but I don't have enough experience to know what's reasonable. Details inside. I'm pretty sure I'm not keeping the current company but I'd like to know a ballpark figure for what I should be paying to make sure I'm neither being taken advantage of nor pricing myself so low that I eliminate quality companies.
I have a half acre lot and fairly typical east-coast mix of deciduous and evergreen trees, bushes, and shrubs. There's a few decorative flowers and a single rose bush. I don't want anything fancy, just to make the neighbors happy and to feel like I live in a reasonably attractive home. I have a job with a lot of travel and odd hours, so I just need minimal headaches and to know that stuff is getting done.
The company quoted $400/month for a year for what was described as a basic total package for taking care of the yard. As a frame of reference, median per capita income in the area is around $28K and the median house sells for $140K. The staff that come out to do the work are not immigrants (I mention this not out of xenophobia but as an indicator that the owner is less likely to be exploiting his staff). I've been a small business owner myself in work with overhead costs for driving time and buying, maintaining, and transporting equipment as well as management overhead, so I'm cognizant that the $400/month isn't just going straight into hours spent on my yard.
The work has felt pretty mediocre. The lawn mowing has been OK, it's mostly happened twice a month, which has been fine (probably around 18 total mows, with half of them only covering the front yard). A sticking point has been that if there's trash in the yard, they just run over it with the mower rather than picking it up, which has led to Styrofoam confetti. I do my best to keep the yard clear, but I live on a relatively major thoroughfare near fast food restaurants and it's pretty common for people to litter. The maintenance people come out on a random schedule and without letting me know when, so there's been times stuff has been in the yard when they mowed.
They did do some moderately heavy effort pruning back of some stuff I'd let go too long and cut up a downed medium size tree as part of the package - probably a solid day's work in each case in addition to what they'd be doing normally.
The rest has felt pretty bad. I had to repeatedly trim back saplings that were growing tall enough to start interfering with the mailbox. I had to trim back trees that were obviously hanging into the view of the driveway making pulling out risky. Leaf collection was extremely poor - I had to drag the owner out to see that the place was basically a disaster in mid-December. Even now to this day, there's still a giant pile of leaves in one of the gravel walkways in the back yard and there's decaying leaves in some of the bricked areas around the porches. There's several bald spots in the grass in the front yard where they let leaves sit so long that everything under it died.
The owner is feels shifty - he frequently will change his story on things. His general stance is that I'm only paying for minimal work so that's what I'm getting, but things that he explicitly promised like getting the leaves out of the beds hasn't happened. One of his staff has a verbal altercation with a neighbor last year (that worker has been fired) and then today I had to disrupt work to go clean up the same neighbor's yard after a different worker reportedly intentionally confettied a cup into their yard with the mower. Between that, the dead spots in the lawn, and general poor quality of the work, I'm feeling like I should be getting a partial refund in addition to discontinuing the service. I'd hired them because the neighbor across the street was using them - she'd dropped them (without telling me) during the series of events that led to the person getting fired, so they seem to be leaving a trail of unhappy customers.
What's a reasonable amount that I should have been paying for a yard like mine? Should I press for some money back or was I paying appropriate for what I received?
I have a half acre lot and fairly typical east-coast mix of deciduous and evergreen trees, bushes, and shrubs. There's a few decorative flowers and a single rose bush. I don't want anything fancy, just to make the neighbors happy and to feel like I live in a reasonably attractive home. I have a job with a lot of travel and odd hours, so I just need minimal headaches and to know that stuff is getting done.
The company quoted $400/month for a year for what was described as a basic total package for taking care of the yard. As a frame of reference, median per capita income in the area is around $28K and the median house sells for $140K. The staff that come out to do the work are not immigrants (I mention this not out of xenophobia but as an indicator that the owner is less likely to be exploiting his staff). I've been a small business owner myself in work with overhead costs for driving time and buying, maintaining, and transporting equipment as well as management overhead, so I'm cognizant that the $400/month isn't just going straight into hours spent on my yard.
The work has felt pretty mediocre. The lawn mowing has been OK, it's mostly happened twice a month, which has been fine (probably around 18 total mows, with half of them only covering the front yard). A sticking point has been that if there's trash in the yard, they just run over it with the mower rather than picking it up, which has led to Styrofoam confetti. I do my best to keep the yard clear, but I live on a relatively major thoroughfare near fast food restaurants and it's pretty common for people to litter. The maintenance people come out on a random schedule and without letting me know when, so there's been times stuff has been in the yard when they mowed.
They did do some moderately heavy effort pruning back of some stuff I'd let go too long and cut up a downed medium size tree as part of the package - probably a solid day's work in each case in addition to what they'd be doing normally.
The rest has felt pretty bad. I had to repeatedly trim back saplings that were growing tall enough to start interfering with the mailbox. I had to trim back trees that were obviously hanging into the view of the driveway making pulling out risky. Leaf collection was extremely poor - I had to drag the owner out to see that the place was basically a disaster in mid-December. Even now to this day, there's still a giant pile of leaves in one of the gravel walkways in the back yard and there's decaying leaves in some of the bricked areas around the porches. There's several bald spots in the grass in the front yard where they let leaves sit so long that everything under it died.
The owner is feels shifty - he frequently will change his story on things. His general stance is that I'm only paying for minimal work so that's what I'm getting, but things that he explicitly promised like getting the leaves out of the beds hasn't happened. One of his staff has a verbal altercation with a neighbor last year (that worker has been fired) and then today I had to disrupt work to go clean up the same neighbor's yard after a different worker reportedly intentionally confettied a cup into their yard with the mower. Between that, the dead spots in the lawn, and general poor quality of the work, I'm feeling like I should be getting a partial refund in addition to discontinuing the service. I'd hired them because the neighbor across the street was using them - she'd dropped them (without telling me) during the series of events that led to the person getting fired, so they seem to be leaving a trail of unhappy customers.
What's a reasonable amount that I should have been paying for a yard like mine? Should I press for some money back or was I paying appropriate for what I received?
My lot is less than half your size and in Southern California. Our front yard is woodchips+shrubs, our backyard is mostly grass. A gardener just quoted me $80/month for once a month maintenance. My parents pay the same ($40 a week, 2 weeks a month) for their suburban LA lot with two lawns. Both crews are Latino and, AFAIK, mostly Spanish-speaking.
We initially hired our guy to do a major cleanup that took him and 1-2 other guys most of the day, including the removal of a small, dead tree and a pretty tall rosebush -- it cost $700.
Even given that your needs are probably more extensive than mine due to size and location, $400/month seems like a lot.
posted by natabat at 12:03 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
We initially hired our guy to do a major cleanup that took him and 1-2 other guys most of the day, including the removal of a small, dead tree and a pretty tall rosebush -- it cost $700.
Even given that your needs are probably more extensive than mine due to size and location, $400/month seems like a lot.
posted by natabat at 12:03 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
So the traditional answer for getting cheaper mowing/landscaping is to go find a hungry teenager. In my area, people ask (and receive) for this service on a local Facebook group and it is quite common. Ostara's prices above are good, and you may be able to get less. For example, here in rural Washington state there are plenty of kids who will mow a suburban lawn for $20.
As far as your current company, if I were you, I would discontinue their services immediately. I don't think you are going to be able to get a partial refund unless you want to go through a lot of drama and hassle that will probably include suing the owner in small claims court. Just chalk it up to lessons learned. But don't pay them any more money, and call the owner to say you are cancelling any further visits. If pressed, you can say you aren't happy with the service, but you don't have to say anything-- and engaging with a tradesman who has already demonstrated that he is shifty and argumentative is probably not worth the trouble. Just be professional and above-all brief.
There are plenty of companies that will do a better job, and a little bit of sleuthing will turn up a youngster who will do a better job for a lot less money, and also build up you ties to the local community.
posted by seasparrow at 12:06 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
As far as your current company, if I were you, I would discontinue their services immediately. I don't think you are going to be able to get a partial refund unless you want to go through a lot of drama and hassle that will probably include suing the owner in small claims court. Just chalk it up to lessons learned. But don't pay them any more money, and call the owner to say you are cancelling any further visits. If pressed, you can say you aren't happy with the service, but you don't have to say anything-- and engaging with a tradesman who has already demonstrated that he is shifty and argumentative is probably not worth the trouble. Just be professional and above-all brief.
There are plenty of companies that will do a better job, and a little bit of sleuthing will turn up a youngster who will do a better job for a lot less money, and also build up you ties to the local community.
posted by seasparrow at 12:06 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
North Carolina, half-acre, mostly "grass" (green weeds). We pay a local guy $185/month all year round. His crew mows, edges and blows once a week (8:40 Wednesday morning, you can set your clock to it) spring-fall, blows leaves weekly fall-winter and also mows every couple weeks over the winter. We pay an extra $150ish in the spring for tilling and fertilizer and the same in the fall for whatever you do to lawns to get ready for the winter. They also prune the shrubbery around the front of the house 3-4 times a year. They don't do brush clearing or anything in our natural areas unless we ask, and that's a modest extra fee.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 12:21 PM on April 30, 2018
posted by Sweetie Darling at 12:21 PM on April 30, 2018
In CT, we had 2/3 of an acre and paid $36 per lawn mow. They cut, edged and got rid the the clippings. We paid $50/hr for pruning when needed but that was always arranged ahead of time. They would aerate our lawn for $150. We handled fertilizing on our own
They did half the houses on our street and would come on the same day of the week most of the time, but the schedule would shift a bit if there was rain. During the spring and summer, they typically cut the grass every other week and weekly during the summer.
$400/month seems like a lot.
posted by polkadot at 12:24 PM on April 30, 2018
They did half the houses on our street and would come on the same day of the week most of the time, but the schedule would shift a bit if there was rain. During the spring and summer, they typically cut the grass every other week and weekly during the summer.
$400/month seems like a lot.
posted by polkadot at 12:24 PM on April 30, 2018
For what you are getting, it sounds like they are over-charging (especially if they are doing a sloppy job of the work).
Depending on yard size, it's $2-250/month around here to mow/edge/blow every week, with some trimming of shrubs. No tree removal or tree-limbing (that's extra). Downside is they mow July/Aug whether you need it or not, usually scalp the grass (cut it so short it dies in the heat), and/or mow when it's muddy and tear your yard up with the monster zero-turn mowers.
If you want seeding/aeration, that's usually an extra $300-800+ (they make a killing on that work.. )
If you want lackadasical (styrofoam confetti and wet leaves left around), that's about what I'd expect from a teenager doing it for $20.
posted by k5.user at 12:27 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
Depending on yard size, it's $2-250/month around here to mow/edge/blow every week, with some trimming of shrubs. No tree removal or tree-limbing (that's extra). Downside is they mow July/Aug whether you need it or not, usually scalp the grass (cut it so short it dies in the heat), and/or mow when it's muddy and tear your yard up with the monster zero-turn mowers.
If you want seeding/aeration, that's usually an extra $300-800+ (they make a killing on that work.. )
If you want lackadasical (styrofoam confetti and wet leaves left around), that's about what I'd expect from a teenager doing it for $20.
posted by k5.user at 12:27 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
...that's about what I'd expect from a teenager doing it for $20.
If your $20 teenager does a poor job, you can fire him or her and hire a teenager who will do a good job. #NotAllTeenagers
posted by seasparrow at 12:32 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
If your $20 teenager does a poor job, you can fire him or her and hire a teenager who will do a good job. #NotAllTeenagers
posted by seasparrow at 12:32 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
Our cost is about $240 per month (seasonal as we are in the midwest)--large lot (250' x 120'): several large deciduous trees, flower beds, ornamental shrubs etc. This covers mowing as needed, edging, Spring and Fall clean up and keeping beds clean. it does not include pruning etc. We also use the same three man crew for snow removal but that is on an as needed basis Cheers
posted by rmhsinc at 2:22 PM on April 30, 2018
posted by rmhsinc at 2:22 PM on April 30, 2018
East coast, Upper middle class neighborhood (no homeowners association tho) about half an acre, sloped back yard. $50 to mow, trim, edge and blow driveway/porch off. (Every 2 weeks) Right now I am paying them extra each visit to do maintenance I let slide the last year. My guy is a bit unpredictable in time because he is young and this is a new business. But he is nice. is close enough to schedule and is doing a great job.
posted by ReiFlinx at 4:28 AM on May 1, 2018
posted by ReiFlinx at 4:28 AM on May 1, 2018
In Portland OR (so, more expensive area) I paid $30 per mow and $25 per water & weed with a local handyman type guy. I didn't ask for any pruning but I can't imagine pruning would be expensive enough for that kind of cost. You should find another lawn care service.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 7:12 AM on May 1, 2018
posted by rabbitrabbit at 7:12 AM on May 1, 2018
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I have a pretty extensively landscaped yard and occasionally I will hire a gardener to deadhead and weed and do other garden maintenance. I pay her $200 a day and she works 10 hours or so. I only use her about 3 times a year.
$400 a month seems really high. I would think it would be about half that, at the most.
posted by Ostara at 11:50 AM on April 30, 2018 [10 favorites]