Would not recommend for residential!
We hired Ashe Construction to do some clearing on our property for a manufactured home and a shop. We met with Jim Ashe who gave us a quote (he does not provide scope of work or contract). He said he would start the work "next week". We didn't hear anything else until Friday morning at 7:00 am when he rolled in with his huge equipment. This set things up to a bad start as we had no idea he was coming and my horses were freaking out and one had already ran thru the fence. I often wonder what they would've done if we hadn't been home on Friday........
So, while I was calming the horses, my husband was establishing the boundaries of where the clearing was to take place with Jim Ashe and the equipment operator. The clearing was relatively a small area and only a few hours of work. The equipment operator proceeded to start his work. He went beyond the boundaries we had set and cleared a beautiful nature area behind where my home was going to be that had trails winding thru it and lots of shade, this area was to abut against my backyard. In my opinion, the operator had finished the clearing early (as predicted) and decided to just finish out his shift with some additional clearing.
I was devastated when I saw what he had done. All of my privacy in the back of the property is now gone. I can clearly see my neighbors now when before I couldn't. This will end up costing us thousands of dollars in trees to get back the the privacy that was lost. We are in our 60's so we will have to buy mature trees if we have any hope of enjoying privacy again in our lifetime.
We contacted Jim Ashe and he came out to the property on Monday am, we discussed where the clearing stop point was and we were still both on the same page as to where that was, so it wasn't due to miscommunication. Jim expressed a desire to "make it right". Well, unfortunately, short of replacing the trees, there really is no way to make it right. He told us he would not charge us for the day. This was a step in the right direction, but basically, he's just not charging me for work that I did not request, and giving me a couple of hours of work for free. Jim told my husband that he didn't want to continue with the rest of the work we had hired him for (septic alteration) and would send us an invoice. So, in addition to what we were left with; debris clean up, cost of trees, planting, watering, etc., we had to find someone else to do the septic alteration. This also ended up costing more because they were not local.
In the meantime, I have a huge amount of debris that I have to clean up before I can even plant trees. What we lost cannot be easily replaced.
Word to the Wise: If you buy property for privacy (like we did). Be very careful about who you choose to clear it. And watch their every step. read more
