It is Hydrangea paniculata, which is often trained or grafted into a tree form, such as yours. This is a very coldy hardy hydrangea (good for colder climates) and it blooms on new wood. You can cut off the old flowers now and thin or trim as needed without danger of removing this season's flowers as it will produce them on growth formed this year. I know of gardeners in my area with these hydrangeas that prune the crown into a rather tight, compact form each season - the blossoms are so large and heavy, they pull down longer, whippy branches.

Looks like you have a dogwood (cornus) and not a hydrangea.

Many hydrangea leaves have this furry feeling, for example, asperas and serratas so it may be easier to post the question once the shrub has bloomed. Post pictures in Spring to see if someone can help. HD and Lowes tend to stick with macrophyllas over here but have had some serratas like Woodlanders for sale before.

With coned blooms and those leaves, I would expect it to be a hydrangea paniculata. Paniculatas develop invisible flower buds in late Spring thru Summer (Summer most likely up North in MI) and, depending on the exact variety, they open blooms around early to mid/late Summer. So, you m-a-y need to wait a little bit more time to see bloomage but... you may be close if you have not pruned it this season. Keep giving them evenly moist soil, mulch year-around and some sun; paniculatas are probably the most sun tolerant of hydrangeas. Because paniculatas bloom on new wood around now, I would steer away from pruning at times like now. I do not know if the way that you deadheaded the plant last summer resulted in cutting off the flower buds that were then about to open. These blooms are near the ends of the stems. You can safely deadhead in Spring when the plant leafs out but just cut the petiole string that connects the bottom of the spent blooms to the stems. Pruning is usually not needed with hydrangeas unless you have dead wood (if a stem has not leafed out by the end of May then cut the stem) or if you have stems that cross or areas where you want to add light. If the plant is located where it can achieve its estimated size at maturity, pruning should not be an annual chore like with other shrubs like roses. Depending on the variety, paniculatas can get from 3' to 10'. A picture of the blooms might help figure out which paniculata this one is so post again later on (or ask the previous home owner if that is possible). On the bottom right corner of the picture, there are some leaves that look like they are yellowing, except for the leaf veins. That is called iron chlorosis and is common in alkaline soils. It requires that you amend the soil with either iron-chelated liquid compounds sold in just about any plant nursery, greensand, garden Sulfur or aluminum sulfate. The links below show pictures of several common hydrangeas (paniculata pictures are on the second link). When you get bloomage, compare the bloom to the link below or post again: http://hydrangeashydrangeas.com/identify.html http://hydrangeashydrangeas.com/identify2.html The maple-like leaves that you see in the neighborhood are called oakleaf hydrangeas and there are pictures of those in the second link too. Oakleaf hydrangeas bloom earlier than paniculatas. Even earlier for me down in the South; most of my oakleaf blooms are spent by now. :o(