You should post this question in the Tree forum, here on Gardenweb, to get some expert answers, but it looks ok to me; I do question the amount of watering - you need to stick your finger down into the soil a couple of inches to see how dry or moist it is before you water, and go by what your finger tells you. If it's still moist, don't water yet. And no, don't fertilize it.

It must be an optical illusion because it looks like it is planted in a pit several inches deep.

Unless it absolutely needs to be staked for some reason, I urge you to remove ALL tape, ties, string, and stakes. Young trees need to be able to sway in the wind in order to develop good 'muscles' and strong 'bones'.

thank you very much to both! we will move our post to the Tree forum. In addition, we did the screw-driver-finger test and have since increased the amount of water to 6gallons every three days. The soil was not holding moisture after the 3rd day from the time we watered. We are not and have not planned to add any fertilizer.

The ball of the tree was left above ground by 2-3" when planted, however, we surrounded the area with a water well in order to help conserve the water (our backyard has a somewhat heavy slope down to our home)... maybe this is what is giving the optical illusion of it being buried deep in the soil. Now, the tree was transferred to our yard less than 3months ago, we were holding it until the roots extended a bit into the native soil. Our plan was to remove the strings in a month or so, is this bad practice? we were following what the builder's landscaper has done with the rest of the trees put around the community.

Thanks again @lisanti07028 and @rhizo_1