Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce have been branded “absentee” owners by an angry neighbor seeking to stop them from installing a six-foot fence and planting dozens of tall trees around their $5.35 million Ohio mansion, Our News Outlet can reveal.
The A-list newlyweds are at the center of an extraordinary dispute with residents of a quiet Lake Erie village as they work to turn their newly purchased luxury estate into a secluded private retreat.
In recent weeks, longtime locals have raised a series of objections to the plans. Their concerns range from the possibility of deer being impaled on the fence’s pointed railings to privacy worries involving drones and the risk of raw sewage backing up into a neighboring property.
The black aluminum fence was unanimously approved by the planning board in Bratenahl, a village just outside Cleveland, after more than an hour of objections from residents living on both sides of the celebrity couple, according to newly released records obtained by Our News Outlet.
The dispute, however, has continued to intensify, suggesting that Swift and the Kansas City Chiefs star’s conflict with their new neighbors is far from settled.
Katherine Bolton, who has lived next door for 35 years, told Bratenahl’s Architectural Review Board at last month’s meeting that learning about her famous new neighbors had been a “tremendous blow” to “the peace and quiet in Bratenahl.”
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are at the center of an extraordinary dispute with residents of a quiet Ohio village as they seek to create a secluded retreat at their newly purchased luxury estate
Angry neighbors have sought to block the A-list couple’s plans for a six-foot fence and dozens of tall trees around the $5.35 million mansion
The singer and Kansas City Chiefs tight end have been in discussions with Bratenahl’s Architectural Review Board since Kelce bought the property through an LLC in March
“There’s a new owner, who is an absentee owner, who is not going to be here,” Bolton said, according to a recently published transcript of the hearing.
Remarkably, the names of the celebrity couple were not mentioned even once during the 72-page transcript of the dispute.
At a hearing on Tuesday night, however, Bolton finally identified the owners directly, telling the board that the neighboring property had been “recently purchased by Travis Kelce.”
The 21,000-square-foot mansion contains eight bedrooms, 11 bathrooms and a two-bedroom guest cottage. Built in 1895, the property also features a ballroom that has since been converted into a games room and home theater.
Aerial photographs offer the first look inside the expansive estate since Kelce purchased it, showing manicured lawns, sweeping views of Lake Erie, a winding driveway and a cottage constructed from the same red brick as the main house.
Bolton told the meeting that she had been negotiating with the couple’s attorney over a century-old clay sewer pipe shared by the mansion and her home.
She said she had received an estimate of $75,000 to line the pipe and protect it from tree roots after learning that Kelce and Swift planned to plant dozens of trees around the estate.
Images from the estate show that trees have already been removed along the boundary and landscaping work is under way, with turf stripped back to reveal bare mud
The 21,000-square-foot mansion has eight bedrooms and sits beside Lake Erie. Town planners withheld a decision Tuesday on the couple’s proposal to plant additional trees as part of their privacy plans
“Planting 50 evergreen trees just ten feet from a 100-year-old clay sewer line is virtually guaranteed to cause severe root intrusion, pipe structural failure and catastrophic sewage backups,” Bolton told the board, citing research she conducted with the help of artificial intelligence.
She also suggested that the new owners might not remain at the property long enough to deal with the consequences.
‘This applicant may decide to sell her house next year, maybe move on and buy another house,’ Bolton said, according to the transcript.
‘What am I going to do when I have 50 evergreen trees on my sewer line, and they’re gone? And I’m still living here in Bratenahl.’
The most striking objections came from Chuck Bauernschmidt, who has lived two doors down for 39 years.
He laid into the new owners over the state of the grounds, brandishing photographs of what he called ‘the total clear cutting of the shrubbery and everything else.’
‘It’s now ridiculous,’ he said, according to the transcript. ‘All the trees are gone.’
Bauernschmidt also warned the fence’s spear-topped design was a danger to wildlife, telling the board that deer have been known to get caught on the points.
Asked whether that was true, village official Mary Ranney replied: ‘Occasionally.’
Bolton’s husband, Bill, who is a former president of Bratenahl village council, also chimed in – noting that a fence would not keep out paparazzi.
Despite accepting that ‘the applicant has higher security needs than many people,’ he scoffed that ‘either five or six feet’ in fencing would not ‘slow down a motivated able-bodied young person’ from potentially peeking in.
‘I think that the greater security threat for the applicant is from drones and the water,’ he said, urging the village to start planning for them now.
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‘Are they going to be able to shoot them down?’ he added. ‘Do they have the right to shoot them down? I don’t know anything about that, but I do know that all over the world the paparazzi is pretty aggressive.’
Jacob Kutz, who is in charge of construction for Swift and Kelce’s home, hit back at the board – insisting they had bent over backwards to keep the peace amid the ongoing saga
Chuck Bauernschmidt and Katherine Bolton, who have each lived in neighboring properties for more than 30 years, were among those to object to the couple’s plans during a Bratenahl Architectural Review Board Meeting on Tuesday night
At Tuesday’s hearing, the board approved the landscaping at the front of Kelce and Swift’s estate but only on the condition that the trees on the south side are positioned with enough room to mature properly.
It held off entirely on approving the planting of a wall of saplings along the shoreline, ruling those trees would stand too tall even if they were pruned.
Instead, the famous couple must now come back a third time with a fresh plan.
Pictures taken at the estate show that trees have already been ripped out and yard work is under way, with turf lifted and bare mud underneath.
A ‘no trespassing’ sign has also been posted at the front of the property.
Swift and Kelce’s side, meanwhile, hit back at the board, insisting they had bent over backwards to keep the peace amid the ongoing saga.
Their team of planners admitted to the board that they originally wanted an eight-foot fence to snake 1,190 feet around the lakefront estate, before being talked down.
‘The house was one of the largest sales in Cuyahoga County, so the homeowner is looking for privacy and security,’ said Jacob Kutz of Tiny Construction, who is running the project.
Jacob Kutz of Tiny Construction, who is running the project for the A-list couple, laid out plans for the property at a Bratenahl Architectural Review Board Meeting on Tuesday night
Kelce bought the property through an LLC in March and was initially lobbying for an 8ft fence around it. After some discussions with the village and neighbors, his side was convinced to lower the height – conceding they didn’t need a fence around the entire property
The six-foot fence that was finally approved will replace an existing five-foot one – and has been shifted two feet further inside the boundary. Crucially for the neighbors, it stops short of Lake Erie.
Property manager Patrick Hyland told the board at last month’s hearing that the owner had agreed neighbors could keep cutting across the back gardens with permission ‘after what happened… over the weekend.’
That seems to be a reference to prior reports that a neighbor who got too close to the house had been met by a recorded voice warning them off the property.
Hyland told the meeting, too, that his clients had paid $7,500 of their own money to replace a broken section of the shared sewer and had the whole line jetted and cleaned two weeks earlier, ‘without asking for any help, just to show that we’re good neighbors.’
Kutz said Kelce and Swift’s side moved the fence two feet inside the property’s own boundary and added two gates so Bolton still has access to the sewer; dropped the plan to run it down to the water; and cut back trees on the Boltons’ and the Stephensons’ land at their own cost.
A survey showed they could have claimed four extra feet on the far side, according to Kutz.
Meanwhile, a gate was added for Bauernschmidt after he complained he felt ‘closed off.’
‘We went ahead and did that for Chuck,’ Kutz said.
Planners in the village of Bratenahl, just outside Cleveland, unanimously approved the black aluminum fence, detailed in the plans above, last month. But a neighbor expressed concerns that deer could get caught on the points while trying to leap over the fence
On the sewer issue, Kutz turned the accusation around, telling the board it was Bolton who had ‘planted some Arborvitaes on the sewer line, basically directly on it,’ far closer than anything the couple are proposing.
As for the stripped grounds, Kutz produced his own photographs of what he said the estate had looked like before.
‘This is not an open field,’ he told the board, describing heavy overgrowth that ‘just hasn’t been maintained.’
Despite the objections, not every neighbor was against the famous couple.
Victoria Broer, who chaired the village’s planning commission for almost 20 years, told the board she was relieved the fence stopped where it did, noting: ‘I do appreciate that the fence is not going all the way to the lake, because that would be in my view.’
Property records show the mansion was bought by an LLC linked to Kelce in March. It had been incorporated in Ohio on February 26 of this year and was used to buy the property seven days later.
Our News Outlet reached out to Swift and Kelce for comment.
