Pros and cons to not having a backyard?

[Anonymous]

We have a half acre of land. It takes 2hrs to mow with a self-propelled mower and the yard has 10 or 12 trees that are at least 30-40 years old. The trees drop so many leaves in the fall that we spend days cleaning them up. It's a huge pain in the ass and even with a gas leaf blower the job is a huge chore. During the spring and summer we spend 3hrs a weekend (in addition to the 2hrs of mowing) doing other yard work. We plan on selling and buying a house on a postage sized plot of land because spending 5hrs a day doing yard work is not something we personally enjoy. It's nice having a swingset but the kids don't use the yard as much as we thought they would.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have a half acre of land. It takes 2hrs to mow with a self-propelled mower and the yard has 10 or 12 trees that are at least 30-40 years old. The trees drop so many leaves in the fall that we spend days cleaning them up. It's a huge pain in the ass and even with a gas leaf blower the job is a huge chore. During the spring and summer we spend 3hrs a weekend (in addition to the 2hrs of mowing) doing other yard work. We plan on selling and buying a house on a postage sized plot of land because spending 5hrs a day doing yard work is not something we personally enjoy. It's nice having a swingset but the kids don't use the yard as much as we thought they would.

Don't rake the leaves. Mulch mow them. It also helps to improve your soil for the lawn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a half acre of land. It takes 2hrs to mow with a self-propelled mower and the yard has 10 or 12 trees that are at least 30-40 years old. The trees drop so many leaves in the fall that we spend days cleaning them up. It's a huge pain in the ass and even with a gas leaf blower the job is a huge chore. During the spring and summer we spend 3hrs a weekend (in addition to the 2hrs of mowing) doing other yard work. We plan on selling and buying a house on a postage sized plot of land because spending 5hrs a day doing yard work is not something we personally enjoy. It's nice having a swingset but the kids don't use the yard as much as we thought they would.

Don't rake the leaves. Mulch mow them. It also helps to improve your soil for the lawn.

That's not feasible. Unless you've had a lot of really large older trees it's hard to understand what it's like when fall comes. This isn't one tree, it's a lot of them. The yard is basically a half acre of 3 feet tall leaves all the way across. The mower cannot handle that and the yard would be a wreck afterwards.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a half acre of land. It takes 2hrs to mow with a self-propelled mower and the yard has 10 or 12 trees that are at least 30-40 years old. The trees drop so many leaves in the fall that we spend days cleaning them up. It's a huge pain in the ass and even with a gas leaf blower the job is a huge chore. During the spring and summer we spend 3hrs a weekend (in addition to the 2hrs of mowing) doing other yard work. We plan on selling and buying a house on a postage sized plot of land because spending 5hrs a day doing yard work is not something we personally enjoy. It's nice having a swingset but the kids don't use the yard as much as we thought they would.

Don't rake the leaves. Mulch mow them. It also helps to improve your soil for the lawn.

That's not feasible. Unless you've had a lot of really large older trees it's hard to understand what it's like when fall comes. This isn't one tree, it's a lot of them. The yard is basically a half acre of 3 feet tall leaves all the way across. The mower cannot handle that and the yard would be a wreck afterwards.

Have you tried? I have lived and do live with multiple, large trees. Raise the height of your mower to about 3.5 inches and run over them once. Lower to around 2 inches and run them over again.

It returns all the organic matter back to your soil and reduces the need to fertilize. I actually collect leaves from neighbors sometimes and dump them on my lawn and run them over with the mower.

[Anonymous]

We've always raked and bagged the leaves but I've seen some folks simply blow the leaves out to the curb with leaf blowers and a vacuum truck comes by and sucks them up. Seems super easy.

[Anonymous]

It depends on the ages and spread of your kids. After K, they use the yard less and less because they have after school activities of one kind or other. It is pleasant to look at the yard, and some kids do play in it, but I think if you trade convenience of a close in neighborhood with a TH vs farther out SFH for the yard, the TH might work better especially if you only have one or two kids.