Property Challenges

When Alex took over, the canopy was reactive. Branches came down on parked cars after Tuesday afternoon thunderstorms. Dead palms leaned toward bedroom windows. The previous landscape vendor walked the perimeter weekly and reported on the turf, but never produced a documented condition report on the canopy as a whole. The previous management team accepted that.

Alex didn’t have a tree inventory. He didn’t know how many hardwoods or palms he was responsible for. Every emergency tree call had a different urgency code, a different vendor, and a different invoice format. Pacifica wanted predictability. Alex wanted a partner who could give him predictability.

He also carried a heightened concern that doesn’t apply at standard multifamily. The property is home to seniors who use the outdoor walking paths daily, some with limited mobility, some in memory care wings whose families pay specifically for the secure, tree-shaded courtyards. A falling branch in a multifamily parking lot is a property damage claim. A falling branch on a walking path at a senior living facility is a different kind of incident entirely.

“Before Green Image, I did not know how many trees I was responsible for. Sam walked the property and gave me a number, a condition note for each one, and a written plan. That had never happened before.

Why Green Image?

Alex connected with Sam Manchik in late 2024. Sam walked the property with him in January 2025 for the annual canopy review. Sam had been on the property six or seven times by then for routine maintenance, but the canopy review was different. Every tree gets a number. Every tree gets a condition note. The interior courtyards count.

Sam started in the back. The property’s interior courtyards were walled off from the parking lot and rarely surfaced complaints, which meant the previous vendor’s weekly rotation could quietly drift below the level of detail required to spot a dead palm against three living ones ten feet away. Within an hour, Sam had identified four dead cabbage palms across the courtyards. Two were over twenty feet tall and inside the property line, where a wind strike could reach a roof or a walking path.

Sam called Rick from the property. Rick asked the standing question on dead palms in May: wind season risk. Sam confirmed two of the four met the threshold. Rick added them to the scope.

Two weeks later, Alex had a written canopy plan in his inbox: 65 hardwoods trimmed at species-appropriate intensity, 63 cabbage palms cleaned, 5 queen palms groomed, 4 dead cabbage palms removed with stumps ground. Total: $15,530. Defendable to ownership from a written document, not from a panicked vendor phone call.

Pacifica approved in February. On 6 March 2025, two Green Image crews executed the entire scope in a single day. Industry benchmark: typical FL canopy crews handle 20 to 40 trees per day. Green Image executed 137 in coordinated multi-crew formation.