Low-ball offer from forester

I mainly want some opinions of the quotes detailed below. I’m not sure clearcutting my forest is worth $3,000-$4,000. I would be coppicing all my cut trees, putting in some fruit trees, a windbreak of magnolias, allowing my oak seedlings the full sun exposure that they need to regrow, and the forest floor is going to massively regenerate with the sun exposure.

I received a low-ball quote (in my opinion) from a forester: $3,000-$4,000 *net* for 4+ acres of hardwoods. I have white oak, chestnut oak, red maple, poplar, tupelo, hickory, black locust, and a few Virginia pines.

This opportunity would not realize one of my logging goals of clearing the 1/3 acre “slice” connecting the 4+ acres to the road and giving me a 2nd entryway other than the deeded easement on the southside.

I had met with a driveway installer over the summer who quoted me a charge of $50,000. I don’t think he understood what I was trying to accomplish. His charge would be for clearing and installing a 400-foot driveway, grading for a house, and laying pipes.

This is my SHTF contingency plan and I really don’t plan on building a house there but wanted to add the $50,000 charge to calculate value lost by not getting the 2nd entryway.

This logging endeavor has so far been frustrating. I have 2 chainsaws & an Alaskan sawmill but as a female I can’t start the chainsaws. I need to work on my upper body strength but I have 100 other competing projects right now. I might be able to move forward with it in a couole of months (God willing).

Do I try to log it myself or keep pushing for a professional logger? Small-time logging serms to be a dying occupation. Foresters and loggers want large tracts of land, so this is quite an opportunity. I’m just not seeing it bring some big goals into reach: The 2nd driveway snd more cash for my permaculture projects.

Without many more details, it is impossible f or me to give a decent reply.  How long is the driveway?  What kind of surface will it have?  What is your location?

The price for the clear cutting seems reasonable, but everything depends upon your location, the size of the trees, etc.

In any case, I would explore both by getting more estimates.   I would error on the side of caution. My initial concern is that old bias of trying to take advantage of a female.

John F Dean wrote:Without many more details, it is impossible f or me to give a decent reply.  How long is the driveway?  What kind of surface will it have?  What is your location?

The price for the clear cutting seems reasonable, but everything depends upon your location, the size of the trees, etc.

In any case, I would explore both by getting more estimates.   I would error on the side of caution. My initial concern is that old bias of trying to take advantage of a female.

I’m in north Georgia. The driveway is about 400 feet long. I had not discussed the driveway surface with the contractor but I was thinking either packed dirt or gravel. My trees are tall and up to 26” in diameter (sorry I don’t know their height.)

I am assuming NW GA.   That driveway price strikes me as insane. But I have never seen your property.   By any means, no matter what it would be good to get a couple of other estimates…..my driveway is the same length ….economics are similar to mine.  Of course, the big question is what is involved in the laying of pipes.   No matter, I have trouble wrapping my head around that price.

Your trees sound pretty mature.   Once again, getting another estimate doesn’t hurt.

Hi Vanessa,
I second what John says about getting more estimates. At the same time, inflation is crazy right now, and labor is expensive. Most people I hear talking about prices being way too high... have not priced anything recently. I ran into that getting my mother's house re-roofed. $26,000 for shingles. Several people told me it was too high, but it was cheaper than other estimates and the people who told me it was high had not had any work done in like 15-20 years (back when things were less expensive.

For reference, we were going to have some work done on my mother's driveway. Maybe 75 feet long. Widen it a bit, resurface with gravel, and put a few large rocks on one side to hold up a bank. The quote was almost $10,000. So, you get a 400ft driveway, plus grading, plus clearing land, plus laying pipes (which are crazy expensive these days)... and maybe it is $50,000. Maybe not, but maybe. If a few different places all come within 20% of each other, I would not say he was overcharging you, thats just what it costs these days. If other places come back at half price... then I would start looking a lot more carefully at things. Because in that case either someone is seriously trying to cheat you... or someone is seriously cutting corners.

Totally different situation, but in case it's a useful benchmark:
I'm in the upstate of SC; we had 4 big mature trees taken down in 2021. These was a residential job, and the trees were all within 20' of our house, so this was a tricky removal process. We went with a local team we trust, and I consider them to be the best in the area. So this was an $8k project. But we're talking about aerial acrobatics and machines that can lock onto a 10' length of tree trunk and gently set it aside. It was quite a production.

Prices are definitely up, as they've done similar work for my folks in years past for 4-6k.

Regarding Matt's comment about cutting corners, I've seen folks skimp on legal and insurance to cut costs. That might not matter in your situation, whereas a properly insured company was an important consideration with our trees being right next to the house. Some will skimp on safety measures too. In any case, if you get other quotes, make sure to investigate why the cheap ones are cheap.

I'm still working through the wood chip haul from that job lol.

Where I live, logging is the main industry. We're surrounded by thousands of acres owned by timber companies. Clear cut land is cheap because it erodes rapidly with no tree roots to hold the soil against rain and wind erosion so you would have to get green stuff established ASAP after the trees are gone. If you have some mature trees, you might consider talking to a  sawmill and seeing if you can sell them the trees. You would have to get someone to cut the trees and deliver them to the sawmill, but if your timber is good, the price you get for the logs would offset the cost of logging. Another thought is to advertise that you're taking bids to SELL your timber (once again, it would need to have to be enough fairly mature trees for this to be an option. A conservation department or university extension forester might be a good person to talk with). Of course if timber isn't an industry in your area or you don't have enough worthwhile trees these may not be options. Another thought is that there are small chainsaws which are easier for women to start and handle. They won't be much use against really big trees, but they can get a lot of the small stuff and you could probably clear a drivable path at least. Finally, our driveway is just gravel on top of dirt in the area we had bulldozed for the house. I think it cost about $1000 for the gravel (he spread it down the driveway and we smoothed it with the tractor or my father-in-law's skidsteer). I can't remember what the bulldozing cost. We add more gravel when potholes appear. We don't have ditches or pipes or any such things and don't really need them because we're on a ridge and it's the country and if we can't drive down our driveway then the gravel road is impassable too.

If you think the numbers are wrong, call someone else.

If the quote for proposed work is high, call someone else.  

If the payout for selling is too low, call someone else.

The worst that will happen is you'll find the first set was right.  Any way it goes, you learned something.

Have you looked into hiring a "handyman" to help you with your own clearcutting and milling...Might work when things are slow this winter.

I appreciate your idea that seems to be that you want to have your shit in place in case the shtf.  

So you purchased tools like chainsaws that you have no experience with, which is fine.  You can gain that experience, and the strength to start it, but it is my thinking that you probably should not be falling tall trees of that diameter if you can not start the saw now.   There is a learning curve there that is fairly large that needs to be surmounted.    So, yes, hiring someone is probably in order.  Now anybody can come in an cut a bunch of trees if they have a bit of skill and strength, but how do you plan to mill it?  I'm assuming that is what you really want to do.  Or more to the point: How are you thinking to load them on the mill?  Logs of that diameter are not going to be light.  I know.  I'm a small guy with a portable mill and this is the biggest challenge I have because I don't have a machine of my own.  I predominantly remove trees from logging slash piles, or harvest my milling wood from downed material in my property.

If a guy quotes you to log your land, and it's that low, it's going to be a mess, in my thinking.

Regardless of what happens, you will need a machine to clean it all up.  The longer the wood sits dead with bark on and horizontally, exposed to rain absorption, the faster it has the potential to deteriorate.  You need to have a plan in place to either have the wood machine loaded and trucked away to a mill, or loaded on your mill, cut, and then piled properly to dry.  I'd say network in the area as much as possible and find someone that you can trust to talk with this about, and maybe hire someone who is willing to work with you and teach you to use your tools safely.

As far as the driveway, it really depends on things like the type of material that you want, and how far that material needs to be trucked from a pit theat the trucker has access to.  He also has to either low-bed haul (or hire someone to haul) a machine to the pit to load that gravel or dirt unless another contractor/pit owner already has a machine there, but either way, there is also a fee.  Any good operator/contractor will be able to give you an itemized quote that can easily be compared with the next guy.

You definitely should be seeking alternative quotes.

Good luck.

ps  you might want to consider leaving some of those trees, or hiring someone to do both the cutting out the driveway and weaving the driveway in and out of some of the trees.  You would thus be preserving more trees, more privacy, and keeping those ecological cornerstones as a foundation for your permacultural needs.   Just thoughts.

Vanessa Smoak wrote:I can’t start the chainsaws.

sounds like you need a chainsaw see-saw. you could then kick start your saw. or skip the see-saw and put the kick starter directly on the saw.

Vanessa Smoak wrote:a driveway installer over the summer ... quoted me a charge of $50,000.

$50k would motivate some checking into alternatives, like renting or buying grading equipment yourself or calling someone else or buying a mule and making due.

Shoot. For 50 Gs I will drive to Georgia and build a 400ft gravel driveway! I'll cut whatever you want and leave you the logs and stick around for a month and start that saw every morning ahahaha. For that money, I'll even do it in the summertime!

Dan Fish wrote:Shoot. For 50 Gs I will drive to Georgia and build a 400ft gravel driveway! I'll cut whatever you want and leave you the logs and stick around for a month and start that saw every morning ahahaha. For that money, I'll even do it in the summertime!

I was thinking the same thing.  I'd have to get a passport again and deal with the border foolishness and drive for days but...  

Because of the variability of the working environment, the "HURRY HURRY HURRY"  approach of log bosses, and the lack of god training there are always plenty of older, partially disabled loggers around.

They might not be able to set chokes or work on the greenchain at the  mill anymore, but they could definitely  handle the labor end of a project like yours. You'd probably have to do all the project management and you'll have to treat this like either an employee or subcontractor relationship because serious accidents happen, and you need to protect yourself (and them) financially. A local lawyer will be worth the investment.

You don't want a meth head or a drunk (very common in the industry) so try to find a recent retiree willing to work at mostly his own pace for a cut of the net profit from the sell of your timber from the Alaskan mill. Ask around at a chainsaw shop, a local church or a VFW or the farm/ranch or gun store. The guy you want will be known somewhere like that. You don't want someone hanging out at the bar all the time, or desperate for cash.

You'll always eventually make more selling more finished lumber than raw logs and the timber companies are always going to low ball you. It is, however, a lot more work to manage it yourself.
The timber companies will also replant cheaply. Replant the same species you cut, like $$Walnut$$ and you take the first step in another good crop from the same land, albeit in the far future.

I am setting up a very similar arrangement on our own  property, so I have been thinking about this scenario.

Best of luck!

Jeff approaches a good point. No matter what approach you go with, check your insurance.

I've suggested it on here once before somewhere, but especially in your part of the country it would apply.  You mentioned that it would be a perfect job for a small-time logging outfit.  I agree, & think a parcel that size would be perfect for a horse, mule, or oxen logging outfit.  They do far less damage to the land, can weave in between trees that you want to leave growing to a larger size, haul the felled logs to the landing, load them on a log truck, and the workers will handle the chainsaw work.  Most of these people that do this work are good honest people keeping traditions alive & making a few bucks along the way helps to fund their "living history".  If you want to see what I'm talking about, go to YouTube & search for draft logging, horse logging, mule logging, or oxen logging.  To try to contact people who do this, I'd suggest getting on the Rural Heritage website & reaching out there, or with any of the draft horse, breed specific clubs in your area.  Aside from custom logging the specific trees that are large enough to be profitable, they have horse-drawn road grading implements that can clear your driveway path & grade it, and if you have a future garden plot planned, they can plow it too.  Just an idea.  The biggest factor here is time.

I would be over the moon if someone on here would log their property as Cy suggested and document it. I have a friend who has working mules (not logging necessarily) and they are completely amazing.

That offer mentioned does sound very low and will risk future use and enjoyment of the property if done poorly. I would go the selective route and cut the road between the largest, healthiest trees with the best longevity potential, which I would keep standing. In almost every situation I know of, that land will lose a lot more than 3-4k$ in value from clearcut logging it. A single large hardwood could be worth many times that once milled. Clearcutting for whole logs is a lot like trying to be a 4acre feed corn producer, it just can’t compete financially with the large scale industrial tracts that were largely gained (in the west at least) by timber barons long ago committing fraud of the Homestead and Graves acts to accumulate their land (a public giveaway akin to Farm Bill subsidies for corn). Then we the taxpayer also fund logging roads for harvests and timber company’s profit on Forest Service and state forest lands with more mileage than our highway system. This is impossible for a small landholder to compete with for wholesale logs.

With that in mind, logging is dangerous work and I’d concur with the legal and insurance considerations being taken.

For the saw issue, battery electric chainsaws have gotten a lot better, but the battteries are the main expense if trying to do continuous work. They are also, counterintuitively, more dangerous in that they do not stall like a gas saw often will upon hitting clothing, PPe or flesh. I also love Silkie saws for hand work and can cut 12-14” stuff pretty quickly with the larger blades. I think for a homeowner, most jobs are close to as fast with a good handsaw if chainsaw maintenance and danger is accounted for.

Hi Vanessa,

Thanks for taking the time to respond to my post.

For starting your chainsaw, I found the following youtube that might help:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgEUV3Oib2Y

This gentleman is in the same boat as I am and built a kick-start rig for his chainsaw.  

Cheers!

Jay