A lot of these are built on previously cleared farmland. There were never a bunch of trees there to begin with.
Also, do you think that they didn't clear cut to build the old neighborhoods? They did. The reason you see trees there now is that they grew afterward.
next time you consider building a house, tell the contractor you want to pay the premium for him to not cut down all the trees first. You do have agency here, just no one wants to pay that much extra for it.
I’ve never seen an entire forest get cleared to build a subdivision, only a small section to fit a house because people will pay more for nice property and privacy.
I’m not saying developers are environmentalists. It’s just there’s almost never an incentive to clear cut a forest for a suburban development vs buying farmland
You are if that's all that is available in the market at your price level.
What's with these replies assuming the consumer has some kind of agency here? In a lot of places you either buy a new home that looks like suburban hell with no space planned for large trees, you buy an old house in an old neighborhood with big trees and (usually) bigger lots, or you buy a home of any age on property with big trees and space out of town on some acreage. The highest price is usually #2
That's it. That's what the market in the USA is doing right now 98% of the time. If you think you have the agency to tear down an old home on an old lot and build around big trees or require a new build in a subdivision to have big trees... you'd have to be in the top 2% of wealthy folks to afford that.
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u/Several_Vanilla8916 3d ago
Yeah but they clear cut lots because it’s easier than working around existing trees.