Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce have been branded “absentee” homeowners by an angry neighbor seeking to stop the celebrity couple from installing a six-foot fence and planting dozens of tall trees around their $5.35 million mansion in Ohio, the Daily Mail can reveal.
The A-list newlyweds are at the center of an extraordinary dispute with residents in the quiet Lake Erie village, where they hope to transform their recently purchased estate into a secluded private retreat.
In recent weeks, locals have voiced a series of objections, warning that the fence’s pointed railings could injure deer, the property may become a target for drones and nearby homes could face raw sewage backups.
Records obtained by the Daily Mail show that Bratenahl’s planning board, in a Cleveland suburb, ultimately approved the proposed black aluminum fence unanimously last month, following more than an hour of objections from neighbors on both sides of the property.
The disagreement has not ended with that decision. Instead, tensions between the pop superstar, the Kansas City Chiefs tight end and local residents have continued to rise.
Katherine Bolton, who has lived next door for 35 years, told Bratenahl’s Architectural Review Board that learning about the famous couple’s arrival had been a “tremendous blow” to the village’s “peace and quiet,” according to the hearing record.
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are at the center of an extraordinary dispute with residents in a quiet Ohio village as they work to create a private retreat at their newly purchased luxury estate
Angry neighbors have challenged the A-list couple’s plans to build a six-foot fence and plant dozens of towering trees around their $5.35 million mansion
Swift and Kelce 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 during the hearing, according to a recently released transcript.
Notably, the couple’s names never appear in the 72-page transcript of the contentious meeting.
At a hearing on Tuesday evening, however, Bolton openly identified the new homeowner, telling officials that the neighboring property had been “recently purchased by Travis Kelce.”
The sprawling 21,000-square-foot residence includes eight bedrooms, 11 bathrooms and a separate guest cottage with two bedrooms. Constructed in 1895, the mansion also features a former ballroom that has been transformed into a games room and home theater.
Aerial images offer a first look inside the expansive estate since Kelce acquired it, showing carefully maintained lawns, sweeping views of Lake Erie, a curving driveway and a guest cottage built from the same red brick as the main house.
Bolton told the board that she was also negotiating with the couple’s attorney over a century-old clay sewer pipe shared by the mansion and her home.
She said she had been given an estimated cost of $75,000 to reinforce the pipe against tree roots after learning that Swift and Kelce planned to add scores of trees around the property.
Images from the estate show trees already removed along the boundary, while landscaping work has begun with sections of turf stripped away to reveal bare earth
The 21,000-square-foot mansion has eight bedrooms and overlooks Lake Erie. Planners on Tuesday delayed a decision 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 officials, citing research she carried out with the help of artificial intelligence.
She also implied 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.
‘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.
The Daily Mail reached out to Swift and Kelce for comment.
