Why do Mobile Home Community Owners / Investment Companies Accept so much Liability?

The question I have is this:

I am finding that many investment companies are willing to accept a large amount of liability with tree issues due to “annual planned budget per location” over clearing out the issues and tapping into the larger money pool of the investment company. In my opinion it is such a risk to leave even the small issues in regards to trees because the tree isn’t “dead” or “dying”. I understand budget is different per location an investment company owns, but wouldn’t it make more sense to rid the overall investment company of almost all liability than dance with disaster?

I guess in plain words: Why would companies be willing to risk a liability like this?

Cost. To fully remove a large tree it can be $1250 per tree, if not more.

I hear you on liability, but sometimes its just not a perfect world. Cutting down a tree doesn’t solve all our liability problems. There are a host of others, such as personal injury, housing discrimination, and weather. Many other “fish to fry”, if you will.

Mitigation efforts sometimes only go so far…

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Trees “can” cause damage, but they are a huge asset aesthetically- they help cool, shade, minimize sound, beautify, help with erosion and water/flood mitigation, and also add value to a park. Nothing worse then a treeless subdivision, or mobile home park.

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What are you thinking is the large liability inherent in trees that, per your question, are not “dead or dying?”

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I want to be clear here, I am not talking about gutting a community and removing all trees. this thread is simply talking about those LIABILITY trees. Ones that are dead or dying and could fall on a home or a person, roots that are pushing up concrete or a pad to place a home. Trees are a huge asset… if they are in the right place and condition. Again I am only speaking to those that are NOT an asset.

I agree, and I am merely speaking about those trees that are a large liability. In my eyes it is more of a financial risk to leave them and not remove those.

Understood. Thanks for the clarification. Be aware that healthy tree can also drop huge branches on a home in a severe storm though. It just goes with the territory. Some owners take them all down…assuming they all are “liability.” (That is a terrible way to manage a park, IMHO. )

It’s a good idea to remove all known hazardous or dead trees as soon as practical. If one of those falls onto someone’s property, or worse yet on their home and someone is injured, it’s almost certain the park owner will have full liability. That said, every decision is ultimately a business one - cost to remove vs the cost of the risk if you don’t.

Last year, I know of two incidents where trees fell on homes and killed / badly injured a tenant. In both cases, the trees were green and outwardly healthy. But once down, you could see they were hollowed out internally. The fact the park was not “on notice” of the tree being a danger helped settle those cases reasonably.

You’re 100% right. When we go to help our clients and view every tree at every address around the community, we will look at all the healthy trees for hallow spots. Benefits of having an arborist on staff :stuck_out_tongue:

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