Fence Removal in DeForest: Why Cutting Posts at Ground Level Creates Future Problems

When most homeowners picture fence removal, they assume gone is gone. But there's a real difference between cutting posts at ground level and actually pulling them with their concrete footers. The cut-flush approach saves the contractor time. It also creates a hidden problem that becomes your problem—buried concrete blocks new post placement, forces layout changes, and can mean you're paying extra on your next installation to deal with obstructions that should've been cleared the first time around.

We're Hodel Fencing—a small, family-owned business out of Monona. We've been handling fence removal across DeForest and the greater Madison area for five years. We do it completely: posts pulled with their footers, debris hauled away, the site left ready for whatever comes next. Spring is the busiest removal season across Dane County. Frost heave reveals what winter did, and homeowners finally see the leaning posts and rotted wood that quietly accumulated. We schedule around that, and we can handle removal and new installation as a single project with one estimate and one price.

Here's our promise: the price we quote for removal is the price you pay—even if a footer runs deeper than we initially expected.

Complete removal means extracting the entire footer—concrete collar and all—not just the post that's visible above ground. We dig out what was set in, fill the void with compacted soil, and leave the site flat and ready. No hidden concrete for future equipment to hit, no unsettled voids in the lawn, no buried obstruction that forces a new fence installer to redesign the layout around what's down there.

This matters especially in DeForest, where clay-heavy soil makes buried footers particularly stubborn to work around when a new installation comes along. Here's what complete removal looks like when we do the job:

• Full footer extraction including concrete collar—not just the post above ground level
• Post-removal site grading so the yard is flat and stable after we're done
• All debris hauled by us—old posts, rails, concrete chunks, nothing left for you to deal with
• Same contractor for removal and new installation if you want a seamless single-project experience
• Guaranteed pricing that doesn't shift if a footer runs deeper than expected or posts are set in difficult soil

Get in touch to talk through your DeForest fence removal project and get a straight, honest estimate.

We've installed new fences on properties where a previous contractor left old footers buried. Every single time, it creates problems. Here's what the cut-flush shortcut actually results in down the road:

• Buried concrete that blocks new post placement and forces unplanned changes to the fence layout
• Hidden obstructions that damage digging equipment and add unexpected cost to any new installation
• Voids that cause the yard surface to settle unevenly after a few seasons pass
• Landscaping complications when concrete ends up exactly where you needed to plant or grade
• New fence layout compromises because the old footers are still anchoring the old design underground

We don't take shortcuts on removal because we've seen exactly how those shortcuts play out—on jobs we were hired to fix. We'd rather do it right once than clean up someone else's fast work later. Contact us to schedule your free fence removal estimate in DeForest. We'll tell you exactly what the job involves and what it'll cost.