Land survey question

Not knowing your state laws. Unless he informed you (x number of years at least). That can become the new property line in some states. I own some land that is @9 ft of neighbors land inside my fence, other side @9’ of my land is on that neighbors side of fence. 5 pieces were done wrong +70 some yrs ago. Long as nobody gets excited it’s ok. One guy got excited. Then he found out HIS LAND is the one that will lose sq footage. Nearly a acre. If it’s “corrected”. For some reason it became a non issue.

 

If you’re only having a potential dispute with the one neighbor, you can save significant money by paying only for a survey of the bordering property line. That should cut the cost by at least 60%. The corner should be marked by a steel stake or concrete monument but these get moved or lost all the time. Also, if you have an old plat map (available from your county) you can use the gps coordinates with your phone to get very close to narrow down the search for the marker.

 

Always keep 2' or 3' pieces of rebar around to drive below grade at listed boundary markers on your legal description. This will allow you to find your markers IF someone moves/removes the markers placed by your surveyor. I also try to keep actual GPS coordinates for each of the markers, this will get you close to the markers.
Also where you can, a fence makes a fantastic neighbor.
If you can, get the county surveyor (Mississippi) to do your survey, and have it drawn up in plat form and keep several copies in a safe place and also have the surveyor to email these in electronic format, comes in handy if you ever sell the property.

 

I feel your pain, I got a copy of my survey from the county records office and measured everything out and planted a bunch of blueberry bushes in between my fruit trees a few feet on my side of the boundary to the property. The neighbors dumbass middle aged guy with a mower weed wacked between my trees and took out all my growing blueberry bushes the first year I planted them.

I didn't say anything but I moved my shed and compost right against the property line to better provide a reference point and he seems to have gotten the message.

Typically a copy of the most recent survey can be found in the county records office. You may need to look on the tax map and get you tax map number and or control number to get a copy of the survey. If you have multiple lots as you say you may need to get multiple numbers and surveys.

I'm sorry you live next to a lawyer. I deal with terrible lawyers in property disputes on a regular basis with my job it's often not fun. They often don't care about winning through winning but rather by bankrupting their opposition.

 

Response is in italics. two kinds of title policy available in my state. The ALTA policy is the expensive one. It requires a licensed surveyor. The policy then insures not only the chain of title, but also the metes and bounds. Now, the second kind of policy is called the CLTA policy. There is no survey. All that is guaranteed is the chain of title.

Now, you asked how you get title insurance without a survey, right? I want you to contact a title company in your state and ask what is the type of policy that they issue that does not require a survey. You will probably be surprised. Otherwise, you would constantly be seeing surveyors in your residential neighborhoods. Those little pieces of metal in the curbs/streets/sidewalks are markers. However, the surveyor on the expensive policy will report if anything is on the surveyed property.

 

As a kid I grew up with neighbors from hell. They tried to bully everyone on in the neighborhood and take property that wasn't theirs. My Dad would have no part of that and surveyed and cemented in the pins along the property line after they ripped out the survey stakes. We were the only people in the neighborhood who wouldn't let them run roughshod over us and me or one of my brothers would from time to time kick the sons a$$ if he started something. We endured vandalism, cruelty to pets and never ending abuse because we refused to bend to these thugs. Long story short we eventually moved because they tried to murder my Dad at one point and the father was charged with attempted 1st degree murder. The father ambushed my Dad and nearly beat him to death with a 2X4. For this the sleaze bag got 5 yrs probation and pay all medical bills and have no further contact with our family.

The rest of the family continued their crap and at one point they were gathered up for an another attempt on my Dad's life. My Mom was in the hospital and Dad called us and said I have my pistol with me. Go load the shotgun and rifles, if you see me get out of my truck and start shooting, cut loose and kill them all. We were 13,14 and 15 when this happened. It was tense but they did nothing. We sold our house to a very wealthy woman and she turned her lawyers loose on them, they left her alone. So as you can imagine I really hate having neighbors and my wife came from a Leave it to Beaver neighborhood with cookouts and neighborhood parties and she couldn't understand my disdain for neighbors.

When I bought my first house I had a property line dispute with a neighbor back in the 1990's. I had small children and the neighbor had chows running everywhere and I had the property surveyed and the pins concreted in the ground and had a fence put in 1 inch off the line on my side and a tree on my property cut down and removed because it was going to cause damage to my house eventually. After all was said and done I was in the yard working one afternoon and the neighbor came out and said hey we need to talk about you cutting my tree down and putting a fence on my property.

I said come here I want to show you something and took him to the steel survey pin in the ground and then to the other one that bordered our property and said these are the survey pins, if you want I can bring out a 100 ft. tape measure and I can show you the tree and fence are on my property. If you don't believe me you can have it re-surveyed. He grumbled I was told by the original owner this and that. I said the survey pins don't lie. He went off saying he would have to talk to a lawyer and i said that's fine and then went to the neighbor on the back side of my property and started *****ing to her about the fence and she took him to the pins on her property and showed him the same pins and said he's at least an inch off your line and in my case he's an inch to since inches off with the fence on his property. She said look at the fence, he's off 6 inches on this end because he had them square up the fence, I gained 6 inches. Windy Bagwell just stood there with a duh look for a moment and went back inside. I never had anymore trouble out of him and we eventually sold the property and I live in the mountains with just one neighbor, my mother-in-law and have 5 acres.

 

Do what needs doing. When the neighbor becomes a pest, say "Wow, this is turning into another Jimmy Hoffa situation."

 

Neighbor worked in my office and sometimes reported to me. He was having marital problems -eventually leading to divorce.

One day, I get home and a metal fence has been erected. The guy comes over and tells me his wife put it up without discussing it with him. I keep quiet. Eventually, the house is foreclosed upon. The loss is only the $100,000 downpayment. 10 years later and the house has appreciated at least $500,000.

Fast forward to the current owner. Wife is somewhat of a pest, but I am pleasant. The neighbor on the other side of her has a war going. Supposedly, I am watering my trees too much. I point out the spring on the hill and not on my property. I warn her that a couple of volunteer trees on her property should be cut down because they will become massive and cost her thousands to trim.

Now, it is years later and the trees are over 60 feet high and cost her hundreds every year to trim. One is overhanging the metal fence and I predict it will fall within the next 5 years. It won't hit my house. It will destroy the metal fence and I will not participate in replacing it. I might ask that they survey for the next fence.

Girlfriend dislikes the guy on the other side of my property. 5 dogs. Untrained. Sometimes poop on my lawn. Girlfriend will pick up the poo and put it on his sidewalk. I just put it on his lawn which he trims nearly daily with a pair of scissors. There is a little bit I have to transfer this am.

 

I wasn't asking for a new survey to be done every time the property is sold - just a valid survey on the property.

It has been a long time since I purchased any land - like 1998 - but it seems like the survey was form 1960 or 1970. Same guy owned it all that time - The title company reviewed everything and issued a title policy -

I guess with something small like a residential home it may not be as big of a deal - but wars have been fought over someone putting in a fence that a neighbor claims is on his land.

Seems short sighted to buy a large piece of land and not be real sure where your property line is located.

Am I just me being cautious - do most people buy land without knowing where the property lines are located?

 

Am I just me being cautious - do most people buy land without knowing where the property lines are located?

1. Yes. Moreover, if a financial institution requires any kind of a title policy, they will have access to the same, and never read it. They have no conception of "licenses", "easements" and probably think that the phone company owns the "telephone poles". Telephone poles are owned by the power company.
2. The last time a survey was done, a brother wanted out of a farm. The property was not contiguous. It was a series of parcels. The survey was done, with values assigned. He made his choices.
3. When I learned that OP's neighbor was a lawyer and that OP knew this, why ask questions in this forum? Go get your own lawyer and get as much accurate information and advice that you can afford.

 

Slob animal owner. I see it all the time, public parks where children are supposed to play are swimming in dog sh**. No surprise there, seems to be the norm, not the exception.

 

I strongly encourage buyers to at least have a boundary survey done (at a minimum) when buying land, and an as-built if the site has any structures on it. If they intend to clear and/or build on it, I can’t legally use a survey older than 5 years for construction documents, and if the land is adjacent to wetlands or the beach, it can’t be more than 2 years old and must have OCRM certification.

 

We had a land grabbing neighbor attempt to move the property line 20 ft into our property. Farm owned by my parents for 50 yrs. Never any problem except with these new neighbors.

Remedy. We paid for a surveyor to survey that portion of my parents property and put in additional monuments. We never sent any attorney letter or other communication.
End of problem.

Subsequently found out that if the neighbor removes the stakes , that is a crime and could be prosecuted.

Property location is in Michigan.

 

Every piece of property I've bought, I knew exactly where the corners and property lines were. Only had one issue with some timberland.

On one side, the fallen down fence was off about 200 feet in places; to my detriment. Way back when, people just ran the fence where it was easiest to run it. This was steep sided 'billy goat' timber land, not a flatland farm.

Fortunately the other landowner was a reasonable person. There were piles of rocks marking the original old survey corners. We both agreed the rocks were the original corners. So we just hired a surveyor to run a new survey and mark the line with paint, since everything was timberland and neither of us had livestock. We agreed to respect the painted line as the new boundary.

That was about 45 years ago. We still repaint the survey line every 8 or 10 years. Never been anymore problems.

 

I made a post in the past about property lines. Long story short I technically ended up owning my neighbors driveway after a new survey was requested by a new property owner. My neighbor ended up owning several feet of his neighbors property and so on and so on for each neighbor. The last neighbor ended up owning half the main 2 lane highway running beside his property...lol Of course everybody's property line stayed the same as it was before the new survey. No way was the state going to compensate the neighbor owning half the highway.

 

Plus, Elliot is too busy supporting O'biden and Kumallah to go around helping people fight other rich, authoritarian bullies.

 

When the new neighbor started the line grab. We knew where the propertly was.
My dad bought the property from the owner.
The owner family already had that propery owner the early 1900s.

But we would need proof then go through the process.

Instead
It was a clear cut slam dunk survey. Cost was way less and hassle free to get the survey and have obvious suveyor flags and monuments.

Had the line grabbers continued posting no tresspassing signs on my parents property, they could be prosecuted for trespassing.

Just call the sheriff deputy and sign a criminal tresspassing complaint. Not a civil case.

Had they tampered or disturbed the surveyor flags or monumet. Heavy consequences would result.

Again just call the sheriff deputy file a criminal complaint.

This approach completely kept out of civil court.
Any court action would have been Linegrabber vs. County gov.

We never needed to post the land because all neighbors other than the line grabbers were good neighbors.

Also we did not post the land.

Check your state and local laws

 

Was his name Potter? In Bedford Falls?

 

It was impossible to give your posting two likes or I would have done so.

I haven't a clue where or how a newbie would learn to read a title policy, understand easements, understand set backs from the property line (like 6 feet so hypothetically for fire engines). Just asking a real estate agent or a real estate broker doesn't do it. Then again, there are CC&Rs.

One Saturday, I was helping a guy named "the bee man" deal with bees on his regular route. I used to have the whole outfit and raise some bees myself. We are on some property on his route. The house appears to be unoccupied. Up drives a rich guy with his kid, he is the new owner. Of course, we decked out for dealing with bees and the guy engages us in conversation. The pool is built above ground and there are bushes running up to it. He asks if the bushes can be removed. I say "no" because the pool is an illegal structure and the bushes are keeping the built up sides together. Anyway I point down the hill at some people riding horses on a trail. I tell him that he has a bigger problem because there appears to be an easement across his property.

 

Similar deal here, a landowning lawyer screwed a friend out of a strip of land.