An arborist opinion from someone who is not bidding the job

What is arborist consultation?

An arborist consultation is a site visit and a written opinion about a tree - its condition, its likely failure modes, what is at risk beneath it, and what your options are. It is sold under several names, including tree risk assessment, hazardous tree assessment and tree health inspection, and they largely describe the same visit. The thing that changes its value is independence: a report from someone paid to look, rather than someone quoting to cut, is a different document.

Signs you need arborist consultation

• A tree is leaning and you cannot tell whether it always did or whether it moved
• You have been told the tree needs to come down, and the only person who told you is the one who would remove it
• You are buying a property with large trees close to the house and want to know what you are inheriting
• Your municipality or HOA is requiring a written report before it will issue a removal permit
• A neighbour, a tenant or an insurer has raised a concern about a tree and you need something documented
• Something is visibly wrong - thinning canopy, dieback in the crown, a fungal bracket at the base - and you want a diagnosis before you buy a treatment
• Construction is planned near mature trees and you need to know which ones can survive it

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How arborist consultation actually works

1. 1

   Establishing what the report is for

   A risk assessment for a permit application, a pre-purchase inspection, a health diagnosis and an evidence report for a dispute are different documents with different content. The consultant should ask which one you need before quoting.

   Watch forA generic inspection sold without asking the purpose. If the report has to satisfy a municipality, an insurer or a court, it has to be written to that audience from the start.

2. 2

   The assessment itself - target, tree, site

   A structured assessment looks at three things: what would be hit if the tree failed, the condition of the trunk, roots and canopy, and the site conditions that made it that way - soil, grade changes, cut roots, exposure.

   Watch forAn opinion delivered entirely from the driveway. Root collars often need to be exposed, the base needs to be walked and sounded, and the canopy needs to be looked at through binoculars at minimum.

3. 3

   Escalating to instruments only when the visual assessment cannot answer it

   Where decay is suspected but not visible, there are tools that measure it - resistance drilling and sonic tomography among them. These cost money and are not needed on most trees.

   Watch forAdvanced testing sold as standard on every tree. It should be recommended because the visual assessment left a specific question open, and the consultant should be able to say what that question was.

4. 4

   The written report

   You should receive something you can hand to a third party: what was inspected, what was found, photographs, the identified risks, the options with their trade-offs, and a recommended re-inspection interval.

   Watch forA verbal opinion and an invoice. If nothing is written down, you have paid for a conversation - and a conversation is not evidence for a permit, a claim, or a dispute with a neighbour.

5. 5

   Written findings, options and a prioritised action list

   The visit ends with recommendations the homeowner can act on: monitor, prune, cable, remove, or investigate further - with relative urgency and trade-offs stated in plain language.

   Watch forA verbal "it looks fine" with nothing written down. Consultation value is the record you can hand to a crew, an insurer or a future buyer.

What does arborist consultation cost?

A consultation and written report commonly runs from a couple of hundred dollars to around a thousand, depending on the number of trees, the depth of the report and whether decay-detection instruments are used. Some firms credit the fee against subsequent work - which is worth knowing, and also worth weighing against the independence you were buying.

See the full arborist consultation cost guide - by material, size and region →

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