Its A Jungle Out There!

[cruzgardening]

Hey guys today i went to give an estimate and wanted to know how much you guys would charge for this one time clean up, this is for a bank foreclosure. One of the companies owner decided it would be easy for him to do the job himself with his lawn mower, he had seen pictures of when the home went into foreclosure 3 months ago, he came to the property and the lawn had grown 3 feet taller then what the pictures showed haha. He started and realized that it was way more then he could handle he called me and said he needed it done today, today being my bussies days, i have 10 properties to take care of i told him i could not do it but would give him a quote he said if i took care of it today it would be a life saver make the story short i gave him my quote and he said i thought it would be less. here are pics how much would u guys charge? BTW i got the job haha

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[CHEESE2009]

Lawn care business tips

I'd try $400 for the grass alone. but only if I could get my tractor in the (backyard?) When you go to tackle this job, spend most of your time trimming the grass first so that you avoid damaging your mower. When you finally use your mower, raise your wheels to the maximum setting and as you push - make sure your front tires are lifted at all times. (this is so that your mower receives proper air circulation, and avoids clogging). Also, for the first pass (or two) don't bag, mulch it down a little bit. I have done jobs similar to this, they look bad at first - once you get started you'll realize it's actually pretty simple. Consider yourself lucky if the grass is dry - that job will get done in no time at all!

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Last edited by CHEESE2009; 04-21-2011 at 06:00 AM.

[Steve]

WOW! What are you mowing it with? How long did that job take?

[cruzgardening]

Originally Posted by Steve

WOW! What are you mowing it with? How long did that job take?

i finished the job took me 2hrs with my help we had 2 weed wakers then we mowed the property haha sad thing is i forgot my camera! haha this area is out of my way but when i can i will take a picture of it and post it here it looks amazing good times haha btw i mowed it afterwards with my honda walk behind dont know how wide it is

[Steve]

I guess the key to success with this property was knocking down the grass a bit with the line trimmers at first and then mowing them.

Do you think doing this job helped you get a better understanding on how to bid properties with tall grass?

[cruzgardening]

Originally Posted by Steve

I guess the key to success with this property was knocking down the grass a bit with the line trimmers at first and then mowing them.

Do you think doing this job helped you get a better understanding on how to bid properties with tall grass?

yeah i honestly think i overbid that one, i could of charge them about $100 dollars less and come up with a profit. Look at this one that i did today i charged $150, it was way smaller and shorter it took me about 1hr then the neighbor came out and hired us for weekly service, so i gave the guy a discount of $50 so he ended up paying $100 and he hired me for weekly service ill be getting $100 a month from the neighbor and $100 from this 2 homes i will profit $200 monthly just for being generous haha what you guys think?

[picframer]

This is when I love our walk behind trimmers, really saves the back and time. We do quite a few over grown areas but almost always septic fields, people for whatever reason let them grow which creates issues for the field and an expensive fix.

For an area like that in the image, we would charge in the $150 to $200 range.

[cruzgardening]

Originally Posted by picframer

This is when I love our walk behind trimmers, really saves the back and time. We do quite a few over grown areas but almost always septic fields, people for whatever reason let them grow which creates issues for the field and an expensive fix.

For an area like that in the image, we would charge in the $150 to $200 range.

so you would charge about $200 a month or for the one time clean up? i charge about the same but this guys hired me for monthly service

[shadrach]

$150 - $200 depending on how wet/dry it is. Cutting stuff like that is extremely hard on belts.

[psparaco]

Ok this is a job i did last year.

They hired us for weekly lawn service. It was a vacant property that the owner's dad passed and he still owned the property through inheritance. We still cut it this year and it looks 1000 times better now that we have been maintaining it weekly.

Orginal quote to cut it was $80. Then we called them back and requested more money. We re-quoted them after work began at $120.00. After it was done, he paid us $140.00.

The deck was not included in the price. We came back a few weeks later and cut and trimmed up the weeds around the deck for $120.

Here are all the pics i have. The lawn this year looks a million times better. They are hiring us to clear out some weeds overgrown in the front to set up for a flower garden to be placed there.

Yes those are airplane wings laying in the pics. Its amazing crap you find when you cut tall grass. Apparently the guy's father was a pilot in his younger days. Both those container boxes are stuffed with airplane parts. lol.

I believe the total time it took us to cut it all down was roughly 4 hours. We first used hedge shears and the weedwacker and a mower with the front wheels raised the entire time. The normal rate to cut this property weekly is $30.00.