Looking for some council friends. Neighbor has a pile of tops left from a very recent logging job. He want to sell it to me as cord firewood, I go to his place with my truck/ saw / splitter cut split stack in my truck & bring home. Less than3/4 mile from his place to mine & very convenient t get at. What’s a fair price for both of us per cord? In my area css firewood goes for between $180.00- $240.00 a cord. Pole length triaxle loads average $100.00 a cord delivered. Many thanks for any advice.
Unless you are extremely desperate for wood, I wouldn't pay anything for it. My question is: How much is he going to pay you for cleaning up his mess?
I'd agree that free is a fair price. Your equipment, your gas &oil, your time. His cleaned up tops. Maybe some type of beverages as a thank you, but I wouldn't break open my wallet much further than that.
I understand the situation and being close makes it look good. But do not go by the local pricing as these are tree tops. Believe me that it is a lot more work getting this wood than getting other wood and after a logging job it can be downright Hell getting the wood out. Being just tops, you will quickly find that it is at least double the work vs cutting trees and perhaps triple the amount of work you will have to do. This is why the fellas say get it for free. 99 times out of 100 around here the tops mostly go to waste because nobody wants to pay to cut them up but I have seen it go for $25 per cord tops and that was all oak. But you do not state what kind of wood this is.
I’ve cut tops for free or 10-15 a full cord many times. He wants them cleaned up so they should be cheap.
I myself would be offering $10 a full cord. It's nice that is quality wood and close, but it is a lot of work or expense (if you have tractor and winch) to turn it into CSS firewood.
I got thinking after my post. As an example of labor, my brother and I can cut up a triaxle load (7 cord) in a morning. We do use his skid steer with forks to break the pile up (makes it easier, but not necessary) and push the rounds into a pile-but other than that, just our saws. 30 years ago my Dad bought the tops from 40 acre logging job for $150. He skidded them with a Case 450 dozer, and I bucked them up. If I could get 4-5 cord bucked in a whole day, it was good. That was using a dozer that would cost $90,000 today. My brother has a new one for his business and he charges $1,000 for a 8 hour day. My point is that tops will cost you, either in sweat or machinery. Not worth much in the woods.
The landowner has already made his money on the harvest. They are on the hook for any additional cleanup if turning back to pasture or clearing for replanting. Any cutting you do for free is less they have to pay. A picture of the area would be in order before paying any money for the exclusive rights to cut
Yeah I'm in agreement with the rest here. My price would be $I'llComeOverAndTakeEmForFree.99. I'm not sure what your area is like but in my neck of the woods people have this idea that their recent mess they just created is worth something. Some even think to price it close to split, delivered and stacked. Uhhh yeah no. Here's the best way I've found to handle situations like this. Call the person (in this case your neighbor) and tell them you'll come and drag their mess away for free. They'll most likely decline but leave your number anyway. Take my word for it, they'll call in the next 3 weeks asking if you're still interested.
Yep.. I was thinking the same thing, let him try to "sell" the wood, if he's successful, well then good on him. First 2 years we burnt wood, we worked on tops left here after logging. All the delimbing takes time and effort, moving the logs before and after processing takes time and effort. The main reason I purchase triaxle loads is because I don't wanna spend ALL my time delimbing and bucking tops. Also, the wife got leary of the logging road on the ATV, so I was delimbing, bucking, loading and transporting, just to rinse and repeat. Doing it on my property is one thing, there's no way I'd pay for that "pleasure".
Guess I should have mentioned all the wood he’s willing to sell me is already skidded out to the landing very close to the road
Yeah.. that's a nice tidbit of info. If it's all delimbed and ready to buck and load, well then I could see paying something. Certainly not full rate though. You mention prices of CSS wood, this is not what your purchasing. I'd lean towards 1/2 of what a delivered triaxle cord would be. After all, I'm still not convinced he's gonna get any huge $$ offers for the wood being at his place. Now, make it fair game for all hoarders.. and it'd probably be gone in a day. (OK.. Much sooner.)
I'd go as high as $20 a load....But no more. If he wants more, then let him keep it and order up a triaxle load of log length and have it delivered to your processing area.
From the landowner perspective, if a hired logger did the work, the landowner typically gets $7 to $9 per cord for firewood. That means the wood was cut, skidded to a yard, and trucked away. From the loggers perspective, a cord here, log length, delivered, is about $120 now. Minus $7 to the landowner, minus about $38 to the trucker, minus labor, machinery, and overhead cost for cutting and skidding. I don’t know any loggers trying to make a living from the margins on firewood. From your perspective, what’s your next best option?
I would ask him what he wants for it. 'That wood only has value after it is in some manner ready to be loaded up. Value of those tops is only the value of your labor and what you are able to work up out of what otherwise would be discarded.
Was the wood skidded to the landing before or after you talked about buying it? Sent from my SM-T280 using Tapatalk
