"Sterling" wrote in message
...
I bought a home in New Orleans - In town not the suburbs. Had a lovely
pool that took up most of the backyard. It was a selling point for me.
Little did I know.

There was a hackberry tree and a Chinese tallow tree that hung
gracefully over the pool. Well, if you have had a pool you know right
away what happened. These two trees dropped leaves, flowers and berries
all day and night. The berries were a poisonous purple which stained
everything they touched. The bottom of the pool and coping was
constantly spotted. Could NOT get the trees down because one of them
belonged to a neighbor and the other was so big, no one could get the
needed equipment in to get it out. Plus it had grown into the neighbor's
fence.

You cannot drain and clean a pool in New Orleans because of the water
table.

Plus I would find dead frogs in the skimmer on a regular basis. It had
to be cleaned all the time and despite the fact that New Orleans was
built over Hell, the water temp was cold most of the year.

I bought chemicals by the case!

There were also two vicious German Police dogs - who did really belong
to the police - who lived behind us and would jump the fence to go
swimming. Their owners were always apologetic - when you could find them
- and would come retrieve them. It seemed they could only jump one way.

It was a terrible experience. I would never have another pool.

Joe Fabeitz wrote:
Ah, the eternal question.

I installed a 24,000 gal. in-ground pool in my previous home (Atlanta
area)
and we enjoyed it immensely. It was a nice centerpiece to the backyard
landscaping and an excuse to have weekend parties. I spent about 1 hour
/
week for maintenance and about $150 each season for chemicals. When we
got
ready to buy another house, we went looking for one with either a pool
or
enough room to add one. In my personal experience, most folks who say
they
would never have a pool because of maintenance, cost, liability, etc
have
NEVER had one and don't really know what their talking about.

So there!!!

Yeah, but look at your setup. A tree over the pool ??? Come on? I have a
totally difference experience here in California.