I live in New Jersey, and my tree snapped during a recent ice storm — it smashed my neighbor’s roof and our fence, leaving us with $7,100 in total damage. Who’s on the hook?

Who is responsible when your tree falls on a neighbor's property?

When a tree falls on a neighbor's property, the general rule is that the neighbor's homeowners insurance will pay the bills. That's the rule that applies if the falling tree happened as a result of an "act of God," like an ice storm.

The only way you'd be likely to be held responsible is if you engaged in negligence. For example, if the tree was dying and you had reason to know it was at risk of toppling onto your neighbor's home, then you might be responsible and the neighbor could pursue a claim against you. However, that's most likely not the case in this scenario.

As for the fence, who pays for repairs depends on who the fence belongs to. If it is your fence, then you'd be the one to pay the bill -- and could potentially make a claim on your own homeowner's insurance. If the fence belongs to your neighbor, then this would be a part of their homeowner's insurance claim.

If your neighbor does make a claim for the roof, fence, or both, you shouldn't have to be involved in the process. However, the neighbor's home insurance company will only pay to fix the damage to their property. If part of the downed tree or its branches are on your land, you'll need to deal with that yourself.

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What should you do if a tree falls on a neighbor's property?

While the rules say your neighbor's home insurance should pay for tree damage, the fact is that what should happen and what is morally right aren't always aligned.

Homeowner's insurance policies usually have a deductible — the amount you must pay before the insurance company will cover the rest — which could be as much as a few thousand dollars depending on the policy. Making a claim could also cause premiums — the monthly cost to maintain your policy — to increase. PolicyGenius indicates that a claim usually causes around around a 7-10% increase in the cost of coverage. This adds up over time.

If both the fence and the roof are your neighbor's land and their insurance will cover the fixes for both, you could offer to help pay for part or all of their deductible as a gesture of goodwill since it was your tree and a shared fence. Of course, there's no legal requirement to do so, but it's hard to put a price on maintaining good relations with your neighbor.

On the other hand, if the fence is yours and you'd both have to make independent claims with separate insurers, you might be better off just splitting the $7,100 in total repair costs so neither one of you must get involved with the insurance company.

Doing so could allow repairs to be made faster and it may not cost you much more after accounting for both of your deductibles. You could also both avoid the big ongoing premium increases you'd likely be hit with if you each made insurance claims.

Ultimately, you need to figure out who is responsible for both costs -- which, again, is usually the owner of the property -- and whether the math works on making a claim or not. If it doesn't, come together to clean up the three and get repairs made as a team so you both save money and your neighborly relationship stays strong for many years to come.