Conflicting Surveys and Property Corner Dispute

Call the surveyor that did the survey when you bought your home, the bank, your realtor, title company and tell them to fix this now............

That is where to start and see who will back their sell.

You will probably need to talk to the surveyor asap.

A Harris, post: 381302, member: 81 wrote: Call the surveyor that did the survey when you bought your home, the bank, your realtor, title company and tell them to fix this now............

That is where to start and see who will back their sell.

You will probably need to talk to the surveyor asap.

Thank you for your quick reply. Which surveyor should we talk to? We've already notified the builder and the new surveyor that we are in disagreement. The new surveyor holds his ground that he's right. Should we hire a new, 3rd party surveyor, so we don't need to go to litigation?

Thank you, A Harris. We'll try and get in touch with the company who did the survey right before closing and contact our realtor tomorrow. All great advice - I'll let you know what we find out. Thanks again!

We can't advise you of your legal rights, that is within the legal profession.

Generally, the original locations of the lot corners will be held regardless of error. Moving corners to their "correct" location is incorrect practice.

Did you ever see the original rebars?

The corners set in 2009 are the correct ones to hold. The only survey that matters is the original one.

Just bear in mind that boundary disputes are very costly to litigate. You need an Attorney that specializes in this type of dispute (expensive) and a Boundary Expert Surveyor (extremely expensive). Don't waste your time with general practice Attorneys, they'll just foul the job up, you need a real property litigator (expensive). Also don't think you can get by with no boundary expert, you will pay lots of money for the privilege of losing if you do that. So the best thing to do is try to come to an agreeable settlement with your neighbor (affordable).

Great advice, Dave and thank you! We did not see any permanent markers - nor did we know to look for them until recently - but they did put wooden stakes on all of our property corners two separate times since we've purchased. All of them were in agreement with the surveys done previously, until this last set in June where everything got shifted to the left.

Joanie, post: 381307, member: 11920 wrote: Great advice, Dave and thank you! We did not see any permanent markers - nor did we know to look for them until recently - but they did put wooden stakes on all of our property corners two separate times since we've purchased. All of them were in agreement with the surveys done previously, until this last set in June where everything got shifted to the left.

Several different things may have happened so you will need to do some serious searching for answers, quickly.

1. The original bars/pipes may have been destroyed during the initial phase of landscaping, utility installation, etc. But, probably not. It is possible.
2. The first surveyor to come along later may have reset them to accomplish his task. Maybe they were reset correctly, maybe they weren't.
3. Later surveyors may have found those monuments and assumed they were correct without checking against remaining original bars/pipes.
4. We have a non-survey that looks a lot like a survey known as a mortgagee title inspection/ improvement location certificate/ mortgage survey. They are performed in certain States to satisfy lenders but are not true boundary surveys, although they appear similar to the layman. I'm not sure if Virginia has these or not, but that might explain why your lot corners have been marked several times.
5. There is a chance that the latest surveyor did the job correctly and the last couple surveyors did not.
6. You have received excellent advice above, and will get more later today from those still sleeping. Most importantly, find a licensed land surveyor to come to your residence to discuss this with you, not one of his minions who knows how to run the gun, as they say, but is not as knowledgeable on the legal side of boundary surveying. You need the big dog in this hunt.

All of the above is good advice. The wooden stakes that are there now may witness the actual corner marker which should be set at or below grade. I'll normally set them a three inches to a half a foot away depending on soil conditions so as not to disturb the pin just set. I've seen them more than a foot away.

Joanie,
Are you a surveyor? I didn't see where it said on your profile. I agree with the previous posts, all good advice. If I may add a few observations & ask a couple questions. Here & most everywhere else, the state registration board has set minimum standards. Wooden stakes are no longer acceptable as permanent markers in most jurisdictions. It sounds like the wooden stakes you speak of are temporary markers & there should have been some sort of permanent markers set (metal or concrete) before you bought your lot. I don't know how things work in other states but here, I am the boundary expert but I have no authority to change a boundary line. The only authority any surveyor has on a resurvey is to retrace the original boundary. Sounds like maybe there were never any permanent markers installed. I would very politely tell your neighbor that you are very sorry about the confusion and you are only trying to protect your interests. Your problem is not with your neighbor anyway, it is with whoever screwed up the survey. I would check with the registration board to see if there have been any complaints with the surveyors involved & find out what kind of reputation they have. It wouldn't hurt to talk to the boards investigator if they have one. These guys need to get their butts out there & straighten out their mess. Replacing lot corners is not rocket science, as the cliche goes but there are rules of reconstruction based on legal principles that are pretty universal. If the surveyor does not know how to apply those rules or won't, he shouldn't be surveying. You deserve better than that. If one of my clients had your problem, I would be out there looking for the problem because that is what I get paid to do. Yes, I have made mistakes, we all do. I haven't made very many however. Not because I am great or anything but because I take the time to do it right & I am careful.
I would write the surveyors a letter asking them to resolve the problem and send copies to your closing attorney, realtor & mortgage co.. The last resort is to file a complaint with the States registration board for Engineers & Land Surveyors. I wouldn't sue your neighbor as it isn't his fault. He didn't do the survey. Hopefully, that will get things resolved but if it gets nasty, you might want to talk with the county Master of Equity. Sounds like somebody did some mighty sloppy work.

Ya I'd bet there are still iron rods in the ground a foot over from the wood stakes. Or like someone said above, the wood stakes may just be lath and the markers under the grass next to them.

Tried to edit my post but it timed out. After rereading the above, I get the impression that the wooden stakes were witness stakes set near the irons or that they were temporary markers & irons were never set. State laws vary but here, permanent irons are required BEFORE a surveyor can sign & seal a plat.
The State Board will be on you like a duck on a June bug for that violation. Also, I don't want to convict your surveyor before he has had a chance to defend himself. He may have a logical explanation so assume he is innocent until the contrary is proven.

In the worst possible scenario besides ones mentioned above, the last survey could have been staked/set using RTK improperly from an office generated coordinate sheet.

Joanie,
You have got lots of good advice flowing freely above.
I'm going to make a few suggestions.
Collect all the plats, or survey drawings you can find, that show your, or your neighbors land.
Post them on this forum.
You'll get the advice really flowing that way. If they are really big drawings, take them to office depo.get help, and get them scanned.
Maybe hire a surveyor, who has a thought pattern like Geometric, above. (I already like him!). And have him check several lots either way of you.
Either way, do all you can to get good advice before you spend good money.
It you email copies of the survey to some of the other people on this forum, they can post them for you. Don't send them to me, my electricity has been off for 2 days and I'm using my handheld phone to put this up for you

Joanie, post: 381307, member: 11920 wrote: Great advice, Dave and thank you! We did not see any permanent markers - nor did we know to look for them until recently - but they did put wooden stakes on all of our property corners two separate times since we've purchased. All of them were in agreement with the surveys done previously, until this last set in June where everything got shifted to the left.

As others have said above, the wooden stakes or laths are typically set near the iron rebar or pin set by the original surveyor. You may have to dig to find the iron marker.

The most recent surveyor may be correct or incorrect...he should be able to give you a better explanation. What evidence did he use to know where the corners are located should be in his explanation, not just I am correct because I'm correct. But could be you were talking to a technician, not the licensee, so he just has quick answers.

Wow - thanks for all of the great replies! To answer your questions...No, I am not a surveyor; and there are no irons/rebars that we can locate. The last surveyor (hired by builder in June) said they were not there, but they are indicated as being there on the previous surveys. There are visible cross etch marks on the sidewalk at the front property corners marking the new and previous front property corners. The old ones from past surveys are still visible and the new etch marks were made in June, almost a foot to the left of the old ones.

We are contacting our realtor today and have contacted the title company and are waiting to hear back. We will also reach out to the surveyors who previously did surveys for our property to see if we can figure out the discrepancy. I realize that the wood stakes are not the official property markers, but both the builder and his surveyor claim they are in the correct location (and it's also where they etched the sidewalk with the cross). The neighbor now believes these to be the true points.

I know this is not currently an issue with our neighbor, but as soon as they erect a fence that is on our property, it becomes one. We are trying to act quickly to avoid this. I truly appreciate all of the helpful responses and will update you on what happens.

Here are two responses the builder received from his surveyor regarding our concerns. We made the builder aware of our concerns on the day the stakes went in.

Response from June 3rd (surveyor to builder):

"Thank you for sending the Lot ### house location survey plat. Note there are no tie dimensions from the dwelling to the left or rear lot lines.

The resite shows where the house is proposed to be located, not its actual as-built location.

On the [name removed] plat, the surveyor calls out each of the lot corners as being an iron rod set, not found.

The geometry of the Lot ### corners we found work fairly well together, meaning the bearings and distances closely match the subdivision plat of record, however, they appear to be shifted to the right.

Without meeting with the other surveyor, there really isn‰Ûªt a way to accurately determine why the Lot ### corners were set in their current locations.

I have worked on the [name removed] project for many years. We staked out the utilities and roads for construction, as-built the roads and utilities, and have continued to work on with house construction stakeouts. We are still utilizing the original control we established at the beginning of the project ten plus years ago.

The bottom line is this, either the Lot ### corners are correct and ALL the other corners we found in Phases 5, 6 and 7 are in the wrong location (highly unlikely), or, ALL the other corners we found are in the correct location and the corners on Lot ### are not."

Response from July 12 (surveyor to builder):

"I sent a field crew back out to verify the property corner locations in this area. We recovered and located the property corners on lots ### thru ###, lots ### thru ###, lots ### thru ###, and Parcel #. All the property corners located on these 24 lots agree with where we set the property corners on Lot ###.

We did not ‰ÛÏmove‰Û the Lot ### property lines. We set the Lot ### property corners in the correct location per the subdivision plat of record."

The problems I have with these statements are that there were no engineers out doing work on 24 properties in the neighborhood as stated. It would have been highly noticeable. We have a very active neighborhood facebook page and people talk about all the goings on of the neigborhood - no one saw them. In addition, we have the subdivision plat record in our possession and it shows the lot corners as they were previously marked. So, his statement about setting the corner per the subdivision plat record is completely false.

Joanie, post: 381337, member: 11920 wrote: Wow - thanks for all of the great replies! To answer your questions...No, I am not a surveyor; and there are no irons/rebars that we can locate. The last surveyor (hired by builder in June) said they were not there, but they are indicated as being there on the previous surveys. There are visible cross etch marks on the sidewalk at the front property corners marking the new and previous front property corners. The old ones from past surveys are still visible and the new etch marks were made in June, almost a foot to the left of the old ones.

We are contacting our realtor today and have contacted the title company and are waiting to hear back. We will also reach out to the surveyors who previously did surveys for our property to see if we can figure out the discrepancy. I realize that the wood stakes are not the official property markers, but both the builder and his surveyor claim they are in the correct location (and it's also where they etched the sidewalk with the cross). The neighbor now believes these to be the true points.

I know this is not currently an issue with our neighbor, but as soon as they erect a fence that is on our property, it becomes one. We are trying to act quickly to avoid this. I truly appreciate all of the helpful responses and will update you on what happens.

So there are existing chisel marks on the sidewalk and the latest surveyor set new ones? Most surveyors hate to see that happen. (Search for the term "pincushion" on this forum and you'll see what I mean). I'm not going to say there is never a time for it, but it's rare.

You said that your neighbor's home was the last one built in the subdivision. Would it happen to be on the overall boundary line of the subdivision? If it is, that is where problems are most likely to show up.

C Billingsley, post: 381340, member: 1965 wrote: So there are existing chisel marks on the sidewalk and the latest surveyor set new ones? Most surveyors hate to see that happen. (Search for the term "pincushion" on this forum and you'll see what I mean). I'm not going to say there is never a time for it, but it's rare.

Yes, there were existing chisel marks there since our house was built and the new surveyor set new ones last month.

You said that your neighbor's home was the last one built in the subdivision. Would it happen to be on the overall boundary line of the subdivision? If it is, that is where problems are most likely to show up.

No, it is not. It is between our house and the other neighbor (who happens to work for the builder), who closed on his house in June of 2013 (8 months prior to us). He has a fence around his property. We are wondering if his fence is a foot to the left of where it should be, on the new neighbor's property, but since he works for the builder, they aren't going to tell him that he needs to move his fence. Not accusing here...just a thought we had. The new neighbor also mentioned that his survey plat had changed from the time he decided to buy the lot and build the house to the time of closing. So, something seems really off here.

I will try and post our plats later today.

Don't worry about removing the names at cetera, this is an open forum. And all we're looking for it's just figure out what's happening