Yes, you are allowed to prune anything on your side of the property line as long as it doesn't impact the health of the tree. If your actions cause the tree to sicken and die, you will be on the hook legally for it's value. It's just like if your neighbor has a barking dog and a shabby fence that separates your property. If you put out rat poison in a steak on the perimeter, and the dog gets his nose through the fence and eats it and dies, you may end up in criminal court for animal cruelty and as a defendant in a civil suit in another courtroom. A tree whose trunk is on another's property but whose shade you enjoy conveys a benefit of increased value to your lot as well. And you lose that benefit if you kill the tree. Plus have to pay the neighbor for it. The smart thing for anyone in an urban infill build is to engage their own certified arborist before even they buy the property. If you want to build all the way up to the 5' setback on the lot, you'd better buy a lot that doing so won't cause your neighbor damage from the runoff of your roof, or you changing the amount of hardscape on your lot, or any number of issues that arise from people living together in closer contact in an urban environment. Like maintaining your neighbor's trees that shade your lot. A lot of this "common sense" stuff is now being legislated by municipalities because sense isn't as common as you would think.

There is another factor that no one has touched upon. I am a Plumber and I have spent many years earning a reputation amongst the local builders and plumbing inspectors as being a stickler for detail, to the point that often an inspector comes on the job site and when he or she sees me standing there they barely go through the motions of an inspection, relying upon the fact that they know my work. In return, I can command top money amongst the builders and I am still in high demand because they know that I will get the job done on time, in budget and have no follow-up problems. Along comes Mr & Mrs gotlotz acting in the stead of a competent GC and they immediately begin giving me attitude. NO problem. The first thing out of their mouth is that they will not settle for the quality of work we do on tract homes. Fine with me, never let it be said that I cheated you out of your bragging rights, I just add an additional 10 or 15% aggravation fee for putting up with the attitude. The quality of the work speaks for itself.

Thank you very much everyone! All clever solutions. I especially like the garage door programmable lock idea and the change all the locks to one key and make one a different lock. MaryBird, I think we are all talking about after the closing when the house is ours. We have our mortgage approval (granted it got delayed a week due to bureaucracy and we had to ask for an extension from the sellers) I hope that doesn't mean that they will delay the closing. I am really surprised that the lenders would require something like cleaning to be done. In our contract, it says something about the house should be swept clean but I would think that that would be something that is hard to enforce. Even if there is dog poop, its not as if it takes a professional cleaner to remove it. It's not that they've been intentionally trashing things but they could take things and they don't seem to be maintaining things. They said they were keeping the wine fridge, but I think that's simply because our realtor used a standard format for the contract and it did not explicitly list the wine fridge because not all homes have them. Well, that's $1K for a new under the counter one. I hadn't thought of moving so quickly as for it to be immediately after the closing. For some reason, I think it will cost more than $150 as we tend to have comparable NYC rates. But I will investigate now. Ideally, we would like to know what home alarm system they use so we can keep all of the same hardware on the doors/windows and just change the acct and codes. Is that how it would work? Or are we able to keep the same hardware even if we switch alarm companies? Also, do we need special locks to go with a home alarm system or can I buy any sort of key lock for the doors and it's the breaking of the barrier and not typing in the correct code that sets off the alarm. I will start another thread about exterior locks. Thanks

It looks like your yard slopes nicely, I'm not sure about the back of the house what the situation there, but the grading should be min 8" lower than the siding. I'm not sure how much backfill they put around the house, maybe it was too much and they didn't account for the topsoil or they had everything graded and your landscaper put more dirt/topsoil in with the mulch on top and this is why up against or over the siding...This would have to be resolved onsite. Also if it's a new house, I always tell homeowners (even my customers when I sell them a newly built house) don't do anything for the first year... give it a chance for everything to settle before you do landscaping and everything else, because any grading settlement, etc still under the warranty for the first year.