I had a huge Maple behind me that had split and grown into 4 seperate trunks and they all grew taller than the houses. I always worried about when it would start to break stuff. But during Sandy I actually saw the top of the tree touching the ground as it was whipping back and forth. Then last year some big branches snapped off and landed on another neighbor's garage. That is when the owner decided to get it taken out and it cost him $10,000.00 over 2 days. It was that big. Now there is nothing big near my house to worry about and I can sleep easy.