Is it Legal to Trim a Tree Hanging Over the Fence?

Your Rights

• When you buy a home or property, you are entitled to maintain your yard as you see fit, provided any changes you make adhere to the guidelines of your city. A neighbor who owns large trees that overhang your land is invading your property. You have the legal right to trim any tree branches or areas of the tree that hang over onto your property.

Rights of Neighboring Property Owners

• Your neighbor has the same property rights as you do, including the right to maintain her property as she sees fit. When a tree trunk sits on the property line that divides your two homes, you both share a legal responsibility to maintain those trees. You must ask your neighbor's permission to cut down or trim any trees which straddle the property line.

Warning

• Do not step onto your neighbor's property to trim a tree, or trim any areas of the tree that sit on your neighbor's property. When you trim or cut a tree on a neighbor's property, you are guilty of trespassing and damage of personal property.

  According to Nolo, killing a neighbor's tree by improper pruning can result in penalties, including the cost to replace the tree. You may be required to pay up to three times the cost of planting a new tree on the property, even if you did not realize that pruning would kill the tree.

Considerations

• Depending on your location, the trees hanging over your fence might belong to the state, city or your neighborhood association. Maryland, for example, has a state-funded program that pays for the planting and maintenance of trees along roadsides across the state. You must contact the city and request that the trees be trimmed or cut back because the law prohibits you from touching the trees.