In the middle of the last century, the Santa Clara Valley was bursting with vineyards, fruit and nut orchards, and groves of citrus trees. The mild climate and all of these beautiful blossoms mile after mile warranted the nickname, “The Valley of Hearts Delight“. Most of it was, of course, unpaved.  Following the end of World War II, the agricultural land began giving way to housing and industry, later more housing and high tech in particular, and Silicon Valley was born. And, to quote a song, “they paved paradise”.

Water can be somewhat scarce here at times – the sub tropical climate means mild temps and just enough rain, about 20″ per year for most of the San Jose area, but more as you get closer to the Monterey Bay and Pacific Ocean.  When we do get rain, where does it go? In the days of big agriculture, most of it found its way back into the drinking water: it was absorbed by the soil, and then it filtered down into the underground streams.  Wells tapped into this water source and the water was used for drinking, cooking, bathing, watering the crops and more.  Now, though, much of the valley is paved.  Water runs to gutters, and they lead directly to the bay, skipping the aquifers and also skipping the filtering process that the soil provides.  As you might imagine, this can screw things up a bit.

One solution is to create more places for the runoff water to get back into the soil and meander back to the aquifer.  The City of Cupertino has vegetated swales for just that purpose behind the library and city buildings, and a large sign explains why the landscaping looks the way it does (a dirt strip with a sunken section in the middle, but landscaped).  This is not uncommon in many parts of the US – I have seen it all over the east coast and the southern states – but a little less common here.  A great idea, I hope it catches and becomes more typical. Kudos to Cupertino for working to improve the local ecosystem and water quality! We need to do more for water reclamation. If it gets all the way to the bay, it cannot be drunk any more, but from the aquifer it can. So many reasons why we should be diverting water away from pavement and gutters and onto soil!

After taking note of this a week or two ago, I did some searching online and found a 2006 article by the Cupertino Courier (now owned by the San Jose Mercury News) about this same effort. It’s a well written piece and if you want to learn more, read on over at the archive:
http://mytown.mercurynews.com/archives/cupertinocourier/20060201/cu-news1.shtml

If a house or other building is going to be fumigated or tented for termites (or other pests), certain things must be done for the tent to go on and to effectively seal the structure.  We call that “fume prep” work or “fumigation prep” work. It is sometimes included in the cost of the fumigation, and sometimes not – so if this work is being done at your property, be sure to ask if it’s part of the bid!  If it’s not included, there are companies that can be hired to do these jobs if you do not want to or cannot do them yourself. (If you need one in Silicon Valley, please email me and I can give you a name or two.)

Anything which obstructs being able to enclose the home or building must be cut back, disconnected or removed.  For instance:

• fences or gates which touch the building must have a few slats or sections removed so the tent can be placed next to the house
• bushes, hedges, trees and other plants which are adjacent to the house must be trimmed back or pulled away as much as possible – at least 12″ from the structure (if trees are touching it, they must be trimmed)
• any other structure such as a trellis or deck must either be included with the fumigation or separated from the house so that a tent can go between it and the house
• downspouts connected to French drains must be disconnected at the ground
• loose gravel, tanbark or mulch needs to be raked back or removed at least 12″
• any stored items up against the building must be removed

Other items which make it hard for the fumigation to happen need to be removed, such as an aerial or antenna on the roof or an awning on the side of the home., a chimney cap, or weather vane.  Solar panels must be drained.

When everything else is done, it’s important to soak the soil around the building (the perimeter) so that it’s really wet going down about 4″ and out from the house or other building about 12″.  The damp soil helps to create a seal so that the fume is effective.

Please note, this list may not include everything required for your specific building!  Your fumigation contractor should provide you a comprehensive list both of what is needed for the fume prep and also what is needed inside the home (food removal, for instance), by way of utilities, accessibility & keys etc..  There’s a lot of paperwork that you will be asked to sign when you hire a fumigator, but don’t just skim and sign: read and make sure you understand everything so that there are no surprises!

Related reading:

Choosing a home inspector in Silicon Valley

How often should you get a termite inspection?

Choosing a termite company (on my Live in Los Gatos blog)

When you purchase a house on a corner lot, you may not realize that most likely there will be additional requirements of you regarding your landscaping compared to other properties which are not on the corner.  This is because corner lots need to provide a “line of sight” so drivers of cars can see what’s ahead should they round the corner.

In most parts of Silicon Valley (San Jose, Los Gatos and elsewhere), in the setback area of a corner lot you will not be allowed to have fences or landscaping that are more than 3′ tall – with the possible exception of a tree in which the branches really only fan out at a height of 7-8′ or more.

For properties which are not on a corner, drivers don’t really need to see through the property to get visibility on the road ahead, so the landscaping rules are much less restrictive.

These rules are not often or uniformly enforced from what I can tell, but you never know when a code compliance officer might show up with the requirement that you thin out or remove some landscaping or fencework, so keep that in mind if you buy a house on a corner lot that is heavily landscaped too close to the street.  Also, check with your own municipality (Campbell, Santa Clara, the county if not in an incorporated area, etc.) to see the residential real estate codes which apply in your specific property’s case.

If you have just bought your first Silicon Valley home, you may feel very relieved to have survived the contracts, negotiations, the disclosures, the appraisal and the escrow and made it all the way to closing.  You are a successful home buyer!  You move in, unpack and then…. what? What do you do?

I have a few suggestions.

First, while it’s fresh in your memory, pull out the disclosures and inspection reports and (if you haven’t done this already) make a list of the items you must do and want to do.  I suggest you include at least 3 categories:

1. Health & safety items
2. Protecting the house from damage
3. Lower level items with aesthetic value (decorating and in some cases remodeling)
4. Ongoing projects you want to remember to do periodically around the house and yard such as changing the smoke detector batteries, cleaning out the rain gutters, doing a “walk around the house” to check for any issues with vent screens, roof tiles etc. (If you have bought a condo or townhouse, this is still important.)

It is too easy to focus on updating to dual pane windows (gratifying since they look nice) and ignoring foundation cracks, electrical problems and termites, so making this type of list will help you to keep on track with the better priorities (1 and 2 as opposed to 3).

Second, pull together all of the expenses you laid out in purchasing your home. Create a file with a spreadsheet of your costs and the receipts that go with it (include a copy of your HUD 1).   This will be helpful in establishing your tax basis and may protect you when you eventually sell the house from paying more taxes than you’re legally required to do.  Go over it with your CPA or Enrolled Agent or Tax Professional as some of them may be deductible on your taxes this year and some may not qualify as related to your tax basis.

Third, if you haven’t already worked up a reasonable household budget, do it now and plan in both a reserve account and a plan on what repairs and improvements to do and in what order.  The reserve account is important because some expenses can come unexpectedly (fences blow down, water heaters die, water or sewer pipes can burst without warning).

Fourth, make sure that your insurance is up to date.  I advise making a list of major items in the house – a walk through with a video camera is a good idea too.  When you complete major projects, update the list.  Keep one paper copy somewhere safe and another copy either “in the cloud” or with a trusted friend or relative, ideally outside of Santa Clara County in case the reason for the need is an area wide problem.  Should your house ever burn down, you would need proof of your possessions for insurance purposes.

Lastly, now that you have a major asset (your house or home), you might consider creating a will & trust with the help of a good attorney.

Some Silicon Valley homeowners spruce up their yards and gardens in spring and summer with tanbark or mulch. While this is a very common practice, it can be a bad idea if too close to the home’s foundation. Tanbark is simply small bits of wood, and mulch is often no more than shredded wood (sometimes it’s peat moss). Why is that bad?  Wood is the food for termites and piles of tanbark or mulch can hide them as well!

If you have tanbark or wood mulch close to your house now, it’s suggested that you scrape it back away from the house a foot or so. (Check for the mud tubes when you do so.) Otherwise you are inviting subterranean termites to have a feast!

Ask your landscape expert what you might use in lieu of these products in your garden.  Perhaps a peat moss or mushroom mulch, pavers, clean compost topsoil or river rocks can clean up the area closest to your house in stead.

Do pools enhance property value in Silicon Valley back yards?  Do they make homes easier or more difficult to sell in Santa Clara County? What’s the impact on resale value?  The common wisdom is that it depends on the amount of yard or lot size, the price point and the location of the residence. When a pool takes up the majority (or virtually all) of the back yard, most often it makes the property undesirable to buyers – at least to most home buyers – and that, in turn, causes the sales price to slip a bit. It used to be that pools were almost a given on more expensive residential real estate, particularly if there is a lot of land.  Today I ran the numbers, though, and it appears that things have changed.  Below please find the “months of inventory” for homes with and without pools and note that it is very consistent, in the fields I checked, that it’s now harder to sell a home with a pool than without

.

Pools appear to make it harder to sell a home in Santa Clara County right now.

Truthfully, this came as a bit of a surprise to me since many of the luxury properties in Almaden, Los Gatos, Saratoga, Monte Sereno and nearby areas do include pools, especially if they’re on a half acre lot or more.  In the past, I remember high-end buyers not wanting to purchase a larger, estate home if there wasn’t already a pool in place since it’s such a mess (and noisy, and expensive) to go through the construction of one. Lately, though, my high-end buyers (properties upwards of a million dollars) are fairly adamant that they do not want a swimming pool. Many of them don’t want the upkeep costs or chores and have told me that they would not use it enough to make it worthwhile.

What about luxury home buyers and pools in Silicon Valley?

I wanted to see if it changed when the data was viewed in light of pricing and not just acreage or lot size, so to finish up this study, I looked at regular sales of houses listed at over $2,000,000 in Santa Clara County (the San Jose area) – these are considered luxury homes here.  For houses without pools, the months of inventory was 5.4 (not terrible, still less than the 6 months which NAR calls a balanced market) but for homes with pools, it was up to 6.8 months of inventory. That’s a significant difference and is in line with what we saw when the question was put with the amount of land involved.  Generally speaking, buyers would prefer to not have a pool, even in the higher priced subsets of the market.  (My advice: run the numbers for your own home’s micro market and see. It’s possible that this may not apply in your case.)

This still didn’t sit quite right with me since I’ve known the most expensive homes to all have pools, so I spent some time looking at homes in Los Gatos, Monte Sereno and Saratoga. I was interested to know if homes with pools were still harder to sell and had a lower resale value, as appears to be the case in more normally price houses.

First I looked again at larger lots – half an acre to about an acre and a half – in all three areas combined.  It was inconclusive but basically there were 102 of them for sale now and 12 which have closed in the last month (so 8.5 months of inventory).  Of those on the market, 56 had pools and 46 didn’t. This was too broad given the variety of zip codes and school districts, so I narrowed it to just Saratoga with only Saratoga schools.  For those in this area, just 3 have sold and closed in the last month with no pool (averaging about $1,850,000) but 9 have closed with a swimming pool (averageing about $2,735,000).  The average square footage of a house without a pool was 3482, but the average house size of places with a pool was 4309. It does appear that homes with pools do sell for more, but also that in general, these are larger homes.  Since 3/4 of those sold in this segment of the Saratoga market do have pools, it would be hard to say that buyers are rejecting homes with pools.  Of course, a 4300 SF house in Saratoga with Saratoga Schools is much different than a house in Willow Glen with San Jose schools – just underlines the fact that the real estate market is comprised of many micro markets.  What is true for the county as a whole may not be the case for luxury properties in Los Altos, Saratoga, or Almaden Valley.

Why do pools hurt the odds of selling for most houses in the San Jose area?

Bigger studies would need to be done to thoroughly address the question of why swimming pools appear to hurt saleability for most residential real estate (the very high end excluded).  But I will venture a couple of guesses.  First, there are weather issues.  Last summer was cool and this winter doesn’t seem to want to end. Pools are probably a lot more appealing when there’s significant doses of hot weather.  Second, we are still recovering from a very tough recession, so the new frugality which is currently fashionable and which has become a way of life for so many of us may be impacting the perceived value of in ground pools, too.  This may change as we move more into the recovery and when our unemployment isn’t just over 10%.

Selling a home with a swimming pool

Home owners, it’s important to realize that although you may have enjoyed and treasured your pool, for buyers it may be viewed as a liability – an expense to have it removed or to maintained. To get the best deal for your home, you’ll want to try to mitigate the buyer’s concerns since worried buyers will pay less and confident buyers will pay more for your property. Solar panels make it less expensive to maintain, and therefore more acceptable to consumers worried about power bills.  Families with small children may be concerned about safety issues, so having a great child-proof fencing system may provide them peace of mind.  You could, as a negotiation strategy or selling bonus, throw in one year of pool service from your favorite provider too, since they may feel ill-equipped to take on the maintenance of a pool as soon as they move in.  A home warranty with pool coverage will also provide peace of mind and a sense of a safety net should things go wrong.

Selling a house with a pool? Make sure it's clean!

Pools, like every other element of the house and yard, need to be in pristine, sparkling condition if you want to maximize the sales price of your property.   When home buyers, especially first time home buyers, see missing tiles, obvious rust stains, rampant algae, leaking pool equipment or other problems, they see both work to be done and dollar signs.  This is even more true if there are no pre-sale inspections.  Don’t provide reasons for your home’s buyer to be worried – buying a home at all is worrisome enough!

Should you remove the pool before putting your house on the market?

Filled pool: what not to do

Some home sellers may opt to get rid of the pool before selling. That can be a good idea, especially if the back yard is really small, but it needs to be done correctly. Recently I was house-hunting with some clients in the Almaden Valley area of San Jose and we saw a backyard where the pool was left completely in place, but filled with dirt and planted with grass. I assure you, that was a terrible idea because now buyers see it as twice as much trouble (and cost) to rectify. Home buyers, if you are neutral on buying with or without a pool, you may find it far easier to purchase property that has a pool as it seems that there will be less competition for it. If you want a pool, you are in luck right now!  Market conditions change and three or four years from now, when we are in a more recovered economic status, pools may again be the hot ticket.  This is a great opportunity to buy a house with a pool while there’s less competition! Want to talk about buying or selling a home with a pool?  Call or email me today!

Since early July, fire danger signs have been out at Belgatos Park in Los Gatos (and I suspect at other parks throughout Santa Clara County too). To the right is the sign at the park’s main entrance.  It admonishes the visitors:

“High Fire Danger  No Smoking No BBQs”

To anyone who’s lived in Silicon Valley long, this is understood – the fire danger is quite high here in summer.  Unlike most of the east coast, it does not rain here in summer (at least not often and not much), and our green grasses and plants of spring turn to kindling very quickly.  One stray match, hot cigarette butt or one illegal firework can smolder into a flame which grows fast with the smallest amount of wind to destroy property, animal life and potentially human life, make breathing bad for days and leave a scar on the land.

This sign at the entrance may not feel very compelling to some as the lush green grass in the background would seem to contraindicate restraint.  But venture to the park’s side entrance on Bacigalupi Drive (or hike up the trails) and you’ll understand immediately why this is nothing to take lightly.

Except for one little tuft of partially green grass, “cardboard hill” is entirely dry. So is the rest of this beautiful open space.

If you live close to or have open space in San Jose’s Alum Rock, Almaden, or other east foothill areas or the west valley places like Los Gatos, Monte Sereno, Sartoga, Cupertino or anywhere the foothills, your property is likely considered to be in a high risk fire hazard zone. If so, each year you are mailed information from Cal Fire reminding you of your obligation to provide clearance around your home and to cut down the dead brush.

Just outside of the main entrance to the park there’s a large and open lot which has a few trees, some prickly pear, and a lot of grasses and weeds in winter and spring.  (It also had a rattlesnake it in by the prickly pear when my daughter walked past with our dog one day a month or two ago.) Below is a pan of two pics I took with my Blackberry and later stitched together – the park entrance is out of sight but is a little to the left of this photo.

These owners have done as needed and disked the field to help prevent fires or the spread of fires.

There are things you can do to “harden” your own home is you live near open space – that is, to make it more resistant to fire. Check out the whole list on the Cal Fire site, “Ready For Wildfire“.

The Garden Conservancy hosts annual garden tours throughout the US, including here in Silicon Valley.  Tomorrow there will be a (self-guided) tour in Saratoga, Los Gatos and Monte Sereno featuring the beautiful landscaping of four homes plus an Italianate Garden at Villa Montalvo, also in Saratoga.

Tickets cost  $5 per garden per person (kids under 12 are free).  Or, become a member of the Garden Conservancy and enjoy discounted ticket prices. They also offer a directory, which can be purchased, of all the tours nationwide.  Great idea fodder!

If you want to sell your Silicon Valley home, you need a good amount of qualified traffic coming through your doors. That is, you want people who really do want to buy a home and who are capable of doing so to have a look at your condo, townhome or house inside as well as out.  Should the photos in the MLS and online be non-existent, scarce, or poor, those buyers may reject your home without ever seeing it.  It is imperative that your home’s photos nicely showcase your property so that buyers want to come and see more in person. 

In this post I’ll share a few tips on how to make the front of  your home show well for the photos (and for in-person visits of real estate agents and home buyers), a few things to do or not to do.  This will help you even if someone else is in charge of taking the photos – you can propertly set the stage before the photographer ever gets there.

For our purposes, let’s assume your home is in good condition, with fresh paint and decent landscaping and is not in need of a major overhaul. It needs to have “curb appeal” before we ever get the camera out.  If not, that needs to happen first!   So some of these tips are really “staging tips”.

In general, you want to think about what you want the viewer to see when looking at  your home.   Look at your house or condo and ask yourself what should matter to a buyer?  Usually it will be the front door, the windows, the roof, and the landscaping.  Make the view of these things unobstructed and uncomplicated. 

In general, a major goal in preparing for home photos is to remove any distractions from the scene if they don’t enhance it.   For instance:

• No cars or bikes in the driveway or anywhere in the picture
• No garbage cans, gardening tools, toys
• No obstacles on the walkway, porch or sidewalk (the hose should be hidden, for instance)
• If bushes obscure the door, path or windows, trim them back to allow a clear view of these
• Garage doors need to be closed (if it’s open, that’s where the eyes will focus!)

What other things should you do, if possible?  Here’s a short list:

• Have the sun shining on the home so that the photo appears inviting (not in darkness or with harsh shadows) – if there are problems with large trees and big shadows, sometimes a slightly overcast day will be better to soften the contrast
• Usually mid morning or mid afternoon is better than high noon
• If you are taking the photos, allow for several attempts on different days/times  – sometimes the lighting is better at other times of day, or weather conditions may be better/worse
• Have curtains open on the inside of the home
• The front door should be visible (if at all possible) in the photo
• Photograph the home so that the lawn area, if there is one,  is more prominent than the driveway, if at all possible
• If your driveway and walkways are “super white”, they will dominate the photos if you don’t work to negate their brightness. You can do that by watering down the driveway and walkways just before the photos are taken. They won’t reflect as much and will be significantly less bright in the pics.
• make sure that you have color by the front door, even if you need to add “color pots”

These are the basics – but in some cases, a little more “prep work” may be required.

Painting may be advisable as a pre-requisite to getting an inviting pic:  Sometimes the driveway and garage door are so prominent that whether you view the home in person or in photos, it’s hard to not have your eye drawn there.  It’s worse if the whole house is one color (say, tan) and the garage door is white – your eye will naturally focus on that huge white garage door.  Better to have only the garage trim be a different color from the rest of the home and make the door match the house. 

A little color does a lot to draw buyers in: 
If your home is nicely landscaped but the yard is really “all green”, adding a splash of color, especially close to the front door, can make a home more appealing both in person and in photos.   If your home is a townhouse or condominium, consider adding a pot or two of colorful annuals near the walkway or door, if possible.

Yesterday I attended a property inspection in San Jose and we found an unwanted resident in the garage: a black widow spider. In case you haven’t seen one, I thought I’d share the pic here (photo courtesy of home inspector Duane Serrano of Tri Star Inspections).

Needless to say, she’s not there anymore!

In Santa Clara County, as in much of California, we have adobe clay soil and it’s expansive.  That is, when the dirt gets wet, it expands, and when it dries out, it contracts. Hence it’s sometimes referred to as “shrink-swell” soils.  (Every state in the union has areas with this problem – a color-coded map on geology.com shows areas with more and less expansive soils.)

Why is this an issue for homeowners and would-be homeowners in Silicon Valley? 

The trouble is that the expanding and contracting soil is far stronger than concrete and the foundations upon which a home sits. A well written and illustrated six page paper can be found online explaining the mechanics involved for those interested in more detail on the hows and whys of expansive soils. (It states that the ground can life as much as 5,500 pounds per square inch!)

What I’d like to focus on here is mitigating the risks and preventing the problems associated with expansive soils. 

The trouble is not so much that the soil is wet or dry.  The problem is in the back and forth, the movement. When the soil is kept at an even amount of moisture, it does not expand and contract.

Obviously, rain is seasonal and we cannot control all moisture on or near the house. We can, though, work to move water away from the house and away from the foundation.

Winter storms can bring an enormous amount of water onto a home’s roof, and when it channels down gutters and downspouts, there can be a large amount of water exiting in just a few places.  Where does that water go?

In 95% of the homes I see in San Jose, Los Gatos and Saratoga, the water simply dumps out at the base of the downspout – right up against the home.  This is typical, but is unwise, as it causes the soils to become excessively damp in one spot.

Ideally, you want to move the water away from the house and foundation, at least by 6 feet or so.   Solutions can be expensive (underground and run all the way to the street) or can be very inexpensive (a plastic extender added to the end of the extra long downspout) as in the photo below.

Leaks that are untended can wreck havoc on your foundation. This photo below displays a foundation crack that includes efflorescence (the white powdery stuff) and rusty discoloration, which is most likely a bad sign for the rebar inside the foundation. The source of the trouble? Probably a combination of a leaky hose bib and water that got under the house from a kitchen faucet leak or from grading issues and heavy rains.

Another main culprit is grading. Too often, a walk around the house in question reveals that the land is sloped toward the house rather than away from it.  When it rains, or when sprinklers run, the water in the yard will come careening toward the house – exactly what you do not want to happen.

Sometimes, it’s inevitable, as in the case with hillside construction. What to do? Specialists find a way to grade the soil closest to the home away from it and to intercept the hill-driven water before it gets close to the home.  Imagine making a tiny valley between the home and the hill, and the small culvert catching the water so it can be diverted. That’s essentially how it works.

High water table areas will require the help of specialists too, as these can cause water to bubble up under or near the home and again create havoc on the home’s stability.

If you’re a current homeowner or home seller in the Bay Area, have a walk around your property and see what’s happening with your downspouts.  In some (few) cases, the downspout may empty onto concrete that is sloped away from the structure, and it may be OK as is.  In many cases, though, that downspout just termitates at the base of the home and empties into soil or landscaping that’s waiting to absorb the moisture and expand.  A home inspector will “call” this.  Are your floors inside out of level? Are the hardwood floors cupped? These may be the result of water not being diverted away from the home – you’ll want to address this immediately, before it worsens.  Having this work done will also give homebuyers confidence that your property has been well maintained when and if you do go to sell it.

If you’re a current homebuyer in the area, watch for this detail. Does the home have downspouts and gutters? If not, you’ll want to add them and then the extenders. If the downspouts are like most I’ve seen and stop at the base of the home, pay particular attention to the concrete nearby, any exposed foundation (watching for cracks), floors inside (looking for “out of level” and if hardwood, any cupping).  Hopefully the floors are level and undamaged.  If undulating, though, you may need to speak with a structural engineer about solutions.

Living History in the West Valley Area of Santa Clara County: Japanese Gardens.  One Is Public, One Is Private, One Is Remodeled Almost Beyond Recognition.

I used to joke with my kids, “history isn’t boring, it’s just taught that way“. Local Silicon Valley history is plenty colorful, and some of it continues on today as “living history”.

Japanese Gardens are part of that “living history” of California. They are lovely, calm places to visit with immense but subdued beauty. Did you know that we have three of them locally on the west side of Silicon Valley? You may have heard of Hakone Gardens in Saratoga, but there are two others on the west side (Los Gatos, Saratoga or Monte Sereno) that you might not know of – even if you have enjoyed a meal at one of them! (Also, of course, there is the well known San Jose Japanese Friendship Garden at Kelly Park.)

The Saratoga Historical Foundation has a fabulous page about these three places, so I’ll refer you there for more reading:
http://www.saratogahistory.com/History/japanese_gardens.htm. It may not be easy or even possible to see all of them, but if you have never been to a Japanese Garden, go and check them out. You’ll be glad you did.

Pet rats – the kind you buy at the pet store – can make the most adorable friends. Pookie was our daughter’s pet and a close family member for years.

But rats in the roof, attic, crawl space, walls and landscaping are not so adorable. They wreck havoc and can cause damage to home and health. Wild rats gnaw on wood and wires, and they carry fleas that can spread disease. Bubonic plague is not an issue in Santa Clara County now, but it is in Tahoe and other areas, so it’s a risk to take seriously.

What kind of rats exist here, in The Valley of Hearts Delight?

In Silicon Valley, the predominent type of wild rat is the Roof Rat (also known as the Black Rat or Tree Rat). The Roof Rat’s eat ivy, fruit, pet food, nuts and other goodies found in neighborhoods. They are identifiable because their tail is longer than the head and body together.

A lesser seen rat in the San Jose area is the Norway Rat (also called the Wharf Rat, the Sewer Rat, or the Brown Rat). This rat has a shorter tail and is usually seen in less developed areas, creekbeds, and farm areas, which are rapidly disappearing here in the South Bay.

Recently a neighbor of ours found a dead rat in his yard, and he called The Santa Clara County Vector Control District office to come out and help him identify if there was a problem with rats getting into his home or not, and to shed light on the issue of why this critter recently appeared in his home. The officer came out and performed this service for free, enlightening my neighbor as to access points and providing a helpful brochure about rats and what attracts them.

I’d heard that Italian Cypress trees, juniper and ivy were all bad – that is, that they attracted rats. What I did not realize is how many other things do too.

Here’s a partial list of landscaping to avoid if you want to not attract rats:

• Italian Cypress Trees
• Juniper Tams
• Algerian Ivy
• Date Palm Trees
• Bamboo
• Honeysuckle
• Star Jasmine

Other rules of thumb to avoid enticing rats to your yard:

• no climbers
• low growing – not more than 10″ high
• plants providing fruit should not be used

I dislike ivy and juniper (and grew up with a Realtor mom so always heard that they were rat-friendly), so I thought I was in the clear with my own yard. Not so. I have climbers and star jasmine. We have fruit trees and usually only pick up the fallen fruit once a week. Apparently that’s all bad!!My neighbors have bamboo. Other neighbors have juniper and Italian cypress.

The Vector Control brochure makes a point that for rats to inhabit an area, they need food, water, and a home (or “harborage” as the pamphlet says). By eliminating the type of plants which provide harborage and food, we can reduce the risk of a rat invasion. After my neighbor’s experience, I think that’s a plan worth implementing!

Recently I had a listing in Sunnyvale where an enormous tree graced not only the front yard of my clients’ house, but stretched over a next door neighbor’s yard and even over the neighbor’s roof. We got the home I’d listed sold quickly,  but prior to closing, the neighbor complained about the limbs.

The sellers, wanting to close escrow on time, agreed to trim the large bough that threatened her roof. They only wish that she had mentioned it sooner so that it could have been a “non issue” during the time of the sale. Ideal would have been a request in spring, which is the better, healthier time for trimming a tree.

And more recently, something similar happened in Los Gatos (with a home not for sale). A property manager of a tenant-occupied house showed up on the doorstep of a tree owner whose large tree arches over the fence. The property manager demanded that the tree be trimmed and that the tree owners pay for it. “It is your responsibility,” she asserted. (Interestingly, she showed up with a gardener – not a tree professional – and had no business card so that she could later be contacted about this issue. So it wasn’t the most amicable approach.)

My understanding of laws around trees and property lines was simple: the neighbors can cut the tree if they want to back to the property line, but the tree owners don’t have to pay to cut it unless it is truly damaging or about to damage the others’ property. If the neighbors harm the tree while pruning it, they can be liable for damages.

But just to be sure, I phoned the California Association of Realtors’ Legal Hotline and spoke with an attorney about it. My understanding was correct: the lawyer cited case law and verified that the tree owners can’t prevent the neighbors from trimming the tree if they want and that the neighbors cannot force the tree owners to trim it unless it is truly causing (or immediately threatening to cause) damage.

The property manager was mistaken and out of line.

A friendly phone call and inquiry about tree maintenance goes a long way toward neighborliness. Most tree owners will take good care of their trees and do pruning in spring, and will discuss the timing with their neighbors so that it is convenient for the arborist to also clean up any dropped branches in adjacent yards. Open communication is always helpful for neighbor relations. It helps when requests come in a pleasant way without rushing or pressuring. But that would be true about any issue, whether it’s trees, fences, noice, odors, junky cars or anything else.

(This topic was also addressed on my Live in Los Gatos blog, if you would care to read more about it.)