New to me lawn, Let's make it better! I need your advice!

Hey guys. So I recently bought this home. It was built in early 90's and I know the prev. owner. He didn't really do anything except cut it for the past 20yrs.

So, I'd like to of course make it nicer with a budget minded approach.

Here's the current state of the yard. It's almost an acre.


As you can tell, the front of the yard near the street is at the highest elevation.



Here's the area's and their visual soil samples




Grass in area 1 is by far the best, but still has weeds.





Area 2 is weeds and just dirt....





Area 3 is a mix.





Back yard is random..





Some better photos of the front that kind of show elevation etc...






So, I know I need to Aerate and over seed for sure.
I didn't want to 2D4 because I wouldn't have much yard with grass. lol
Figured I would try and overseed and feed as much as possible this year and spray 2d4 etc... next year.
I was going to also lightly dethatch (a pull behind drag, not a powered)

I have tons of moles so I need to put something down in general to kill everything including the grubs.
Home depot has this for pretty cheap, on the right. It's $6 a bag. Only need a few bags.
Is the one of the left better for twice as much>



Im cutting with a Scag 3 wheel at around 4", also what the prev. owner did.

Find a farm and garden place and go ask them. I have not had good luck with either brand.

I think BlazNT hit the nail on the head. That would be the place to start. It certainly appears you have multiple problems to address.

In addition to going to a local garden center I would do some soil testing to check the pH. Adjust as necessary when the results come in. You can tailor it to whatever grass you want to grow. Your garden center might have kits to send out to the county agent, etc. for testing.

It also appears the worst grass is in the highest part of the yard. That indicates to me watering is in your future to keep that area a little nicer looking once you get some grass growing.

Nice looking pear tree you have. ............ Rhett

Never had much luck with either insecticide shown. Still put them down, but more for fleas and tick control since we have dogs. I notice you have either urine damage or brown spot in the back. I've tried many things to remedy urine spots, including gypsum, pills for the dogs that supposedly lessened damage, over seeding and just plain watering. I've yet to find something that works.

After letting my front 1/3 acre deteriorate through lack of knowlege I finally had a soil sample evaluated by a pro lab. It showed extreme acidity and recommended adding a big load of lime to approach the ideal 7.0 pH. I did this and then I had a pro come out to replant because I simply did not have a lawn tractor strong enough to rip and rake the weeks. I regret the method he used even though it worked. He sprayed herbicide on everything and let it sit for two weeks. Then ran engine powered , walk behind rototillers , raked up weeds and roots. Spread seed and covered with mulch. I got a good lawn out of it. With the improved pH the grass does indeed squeeze out most weeds. I am mowing more often now and allowing the clippings to fall onto the lawn.

But the two young men who saturated the area with strong herbicide did not wear chemical masks and for that I am unhappy. The stench inside the house was terrible for days. I have read recently that there is a liklihood that overexposure to herbicides is carcinogenic. For that reason I now wear a chem cartridge mask even when spot spraying weeds. Take heed and protect your old age (if you want to reach it).

Go to your university extension for lawn management. They have info for your climate. Lawn insect products do not control moles. Grubs destroying your lawn need instant help with products that have something like Dylox. Bayer has it under rescue lawn product. The product that last all season long to prevent grubs in most often Imidacloprid. and Bayer sells it with fertilizer. The Spectracide stuff is very good for surface insects but very poor for grubs. The season long stuff is time sensitive. Mid summer is typical. The Spectracide stuff does kill a lot of the beetles that make the grubs. But that is about the best it does. The weeds in your lawn are of a type that matter little in the heat of summer. Crabgrass and Bermuda grass that green up later will destroy your newly seeded lawn so just kill weeds all spring and summer and then over seed this fall. You can fertilize all you want now and later this fall to make the good grass better and the crabgrass thicker so you have a nice looking summer lawn that has lots of cover to overseed in this fall. By next summer the new grass will be rooted and able to crowd out some weeds and strong enough to use crabgrass preventers on. The main problem weed in your lawn looks to be Creeping Violets or Creeping Charlie. Start spraying them now. Get them couple times over a months time. Next spring you can get them again. They never all die. But at least some control keeps them from taking over.

If you use a lot of total kill insecticides on you soil consider adding beneficial species the following year.
A lot of thses products also kill earth worms and ants both of which are necessary for a healthy lawn.

I know Grubex is high dollar, but it has done a pretty good job of getting the grubs THUS the moles too. I've heard of a thing called Milky Spore that is also supposed to be good but have no experience with.

Grubex never worked well for me in the North, always put down two applications every year, always got infested. More because my neighbor's lawns were in bad shape to begin with so the grubs moved over to mine to eat the roots. I'm thinking if trying milky spore down in SC, but that stuff ain't cheap. Will cost over $200 for one application of 20,000 sf, and I don't know if it really works. Supposed to last 10 years if it does, so I might bite the bullet and try.