how fast do lilacs, hydrangeas, and forsythia grow?

Buy the plants. First of all, what seed? Second plants from seed are often not the same type plant as the parent. This is due to them being hybrids. Third, it takes many more years. Most landscape plants are grown from cuttings, in controlled growing conditions to maximize their growth, probably far diffreent than you landscape climate.......think greenhouses. Then these are lined out in containers and grown for several years, perhaps being repotted to a larger container before being offered to you.

This is assuming you know what you are doing growing from seed. It's not just tossing seed out and waiting for it to sprout. Could be the seed needs special pretreatment such as scarification to germinate.

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RE:

how fast do lilacs, hydrangeas, and forsythia grow?

We want to plant some in our backyard, but don't know if we should spend more money on buying the already started bushes, or if we should plant them from seed...

I don't know why I keep getting shocked that all plants grow from seeds. I'm just used to getting bushes from gardening centers. I suspect I'm like that, because seeds are harder to find and they have to go through striation and all sorts of stuff to get them to start.

Frankly, it's just easier to buy the small bushes, and it's not all that expensive. I bought two forsythia for less than $10, and I know I don't spend more than $10 for any plant, so my dwarf lilac was less than that, too. Hydrangeas? Nah, not enough room and I'm too lazy to go through all the work of keeping them the color I'd want. (It has something to do with the acidity of the soil.)

Despite both the lilac and forsythia coming as little tykes (not bushy at all - they came in the mail and weren't in much or any soil when they arrived. Long enough time ago, that I forgot exactly what the deal was, but they were closer to sticks than bushes.)

I know I got my first flower on the lilac a mere two years later - now (seven years later) it blooms like a champ. It's dwarf, so I don't have to worry about it continuing to grow. Regular ones do keep growing, you know.

The forsythia is about 4 years old now. The first year, it was a cute little bush. (Good thing I bought two - one died. I didn't have a good place to grow it, so I was going to donate it to our local park, but it died before that.) The next spring I saw the first flowers - just one branch, but it was exciting. It was still chest high already, but, that's only 3 feet high, since it's growing in a container. It got bushy enough that I had to trim it then. The next spring (2010), a few branches flowered. I had to trim it three times to keep it within container size though last summer though. This year most bloomed, but it's only May and I've already had to do my first trim of the year. They grow big, fast. I just don't know how long it takes to go from seed to that small stick or two I got when mine first arrived.

Sorry, can't help you with hydrangea at all.

Growing Forsythia

Buy small plants that are already growing. They are very fast growers and will be large bushes within 3 or 4 years.

Starting from seeds? Not worth the effort, if you can find seeds.