I mow in 22207.

We used to before we had kids. Rather spend our precious weekends with them. When they're older we'll pick it back up.

We tried and it absolutely did not work. We finally gave in and got a yard service to come and move some plants around, and tru green to get some grass. We have tons of trees and tons of leaves and branchesso the lawn service is absolutely key. I love our trees (12 huge ones on .25 acre) but had no idea that they would make taking care of our yard so complicated.

Anonymous wrote:I think it's more of an indicator of dual-working households. Nobody has time to take care of their yard. I recently started gardening, since I am no longer working and am really enjoying it. When I was working full time, it was a chore, now it's a luxury.

+1 two FT jobs, 2 young kids. Our yard looked like a wreck for a bit and now we have a landscaping service. At this point I'd rather not have a SFH than maintain our small yard myself.

I mow my lawn as part of exercise, to save $3200 per year, and to keep the gas mowers/ blowers away from my property.

Anonymous wrote:I think it's more of an indicator of dual-working households. Nobody has time to take care of their yard. I recently started gardening, since I am no longer working and am really enjoying it. When I was working full time, it was a chore, now it's a luxury.

My family has three kids and we both work. HHI $250k. We mow our grass. I think in our UMC neighborhood about 75% outsource all mowing and landscaping.

We have a mowing service because my DH and I argued about it when we didn't. We also pay for leaf cleanup a few times in the fall because we have several huge trees. I take care of the gardening myself and even though we have a tiny yard, it's a freaking ton of work and time. This weekend I de-thatched and overseeded and still have a ton of weeding and planting to do. I enjoy it but I wouldn't mind paying someone else to do some of it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you set up low maintenance landscaping and mow about once every two weeks, or only when needed, the amount of work usually pretty small.

Mowing twice monthly isn't low maintenence

You must be joking or extremely slow when you mow.

We’re diy lawn people, we can afford to hire out but enjoy the outdoors time. I do the flower beds and dh mows/trims/prunes.

Some years back, a distant relative who looked like the vision of health passed away from yardwork/mowing the lawn due to an undiagnosed heart condition. It was a complete shock. As a result I just feel like it's best to leave it to the professionals.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think a lot of men in this area are techy and don't really know how or want to do the typical men things. So they just hire it out.

Nothing to do with being techy. Techy people know how to operate machines.

Maybe suits have this problem.

I think there’s something to this though. DC has way more men who are totally useless when it comes to being handy compared to most other cities in the country, including NYC. It’s the reason why people on here talk about spending $50,000 on a bathroom; anything not done on a spreadsheet is foreign to them and they get taken advantage of by tradespeople who capitalize on their ignorance.

THIS!!! They have no clue and pay obscene prices.

We're in McLean. All the houses are on 1 acre. Nobody does their own. The service runs about $600-$800/month year round for everything.

We mow our own lawn, but have a service for aeration, mulch, etc.

My friend just told me his budget for his yard (including a couple of gardens) is $120k!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't have the time. I don't want to waste weekends doing yard work. I'd rather pay someone to do the yard while I take the dogs for a good long walk.

How big is your yard that it would take weekends? I have about 1/4 acre and it takes a couple hours a week at most to maintain in very good condition including mowing. I spend about four times that just working out each week.

Not that big. Smaller than yours! But I work 50-60 hour weeks, Monday-Fridays and quite often part of Sundays is work. Every free hour on Saturday and Sunday is precious to me.

If I had the time I'd probably enjoy some yard work to be outside and be physically active. But I don't. I want to take the dogs to a nature preserve, I want to play tennis, I want to cycle. Doing yard work means I have to give up something I'd rather do.

Same reason why I have cleaners.