An old client stopped by. He was approached by the neighbor to his north who explained to him that his house is "over the property line" onto them. The "proof" is the survey from the city.
Of course there isn't a survey from the city, only the lines from the city GIS. Seems the title people are stopping a sale cause of the "encroachment".
The neighbors seem to want him to fix it.
Lordy, he wanted to know what he should do about it. I told him to tell the neighbor to have their lot surveyed and when they find someone to do it I can give them my survey of my clients property which shows his house 12' from the property line and easily on his property. The common line was in a concrete driveway which was replaced over a decade ago. My survey was 30 years ago. Of course the neighbor wants him to pay for it. I told him to tell the neighbor that their house shows up 5 or so feet into the neighbor to the north. And the GIS lines are not only shifted 10-15' south of reality, but probably the same amount west.
We live in stupid times.
GIS : Get It Surveyed
Good reply to the client.
Our County GIS has the tax map superimposed on aerial photos. Sometimes it is dead on, sometimes I get a job to prove it is wrong. A few years ago the sale, which would have happened without a survey, stopped because the county mapping showed the house corner 5 feet over the line. After the survey, they learned they have a 25 foot side yard. Yes, they should not have had to pay for that, but they intended to close without a survey, so I think it all worked out.
Ken
GIS : Get It Surveyed
The gift that keeps on giving. Some of the most colossal and expensive fubars I've come across have their origins in someone hitting the GIS 'easy button', usually someone that should know better but is trying to save a buck not getting a survey done.
Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get me.
In this part of the world most of the GIS lines on the aerial are off about seven feet, but I have seen them off ninety feet. The GIS people are grateful when I send them the AutoCAD file showing the real lines and the physical features.
The neighbors seem to want him to fix it.
Of course the neighbor wants him to pay for it.
Ugh, I think I would have a hard time keeping my cool if someone was telling me stuff like this.
I told him to tell the neighbor to have their lot surveyed and when they find someone to do it I can give them my survey of my clients property which shows his house 12' from the property line and easily on his property.
Why not just give everyone a copy of the survey now and put an end to this madness?
When that GIS first came out (I was at County DPW at the time) they showed my property line right down the middle of my house.
In extreme local cases GIS lines are up to 1500' off. One client of mine had his east property line mis-plotted by the GIS into him by 600+ feet. The north line wasn't much better. Property lines for the area in the OP were given to the city years ago and showed all the property lines clear of encroachments when mapped over the new (2003) photos taken for a FEMA update. But all that good data is lost now. I don't know where it went, but they updated the GIS programs and POOF it was gone. I will say the important info in GIS has improved such as ownership, addressing, ect. But property lines got way worse.
The city got into a lawsuit over zoning, the GIS map showed an area zoned R1 (townhouses, small lots, apartment housing), but the ordinance showed it R3 (single family housing). Upset neighbors sued. The city joined defending the R3 ordinance designation.
The judge went with the GIS map, overriding the CYA statement on the GIS. Mostly because the city council made the GIS zoning "official". Thus, extinguishing all the previous zoning plans.
Agreed, we live in stupid times.
People will pay half a million dollars for a home but balk at a thousand dollar boundary survey.
@williamh Soooo true. I had a guy in a $800K+ work me over for a month on a price for a boundary survey for a new fence. I finally asked him how much the fence was gonna cost. I think it was $8,000 at that time. I finally told him my new price was $8,000 as that is what he would sue me for if was wrong. He stopped calling.
Surveyors could be part of the solution to this confusion if we stopped making excuses for PLSs lacking the discipline to understand geodetic reference systems. It's going to happen eventually, why not steer the ship instead of waiting for the GISers to pull us there?
Surveyors could be part of the solution to this confusion if we stopped making excuses for PLSs lacking the discipline to understand geodetic reference systems. It's going to happen eventually, why not steer the ship instead of waiting for the GISers to pull us there?
I have no idea what you mean, we have been feeding GIS'ers data for decades on geographic systems. If they can't handle it, it's not on the surveyors. It's only and totally the fault of computer jockeys.
We recently performed an ALTA/NSPS survey and a topo for design of new commercial site. The tax map missed a parcel between our subject and a residential subdivision. Didn't show it at all. Plan reviewers pushed the stop button because it joins residential and will require a buffer that will kill the project. The ghost parcel has a tower and buildings on it that belong to someone. We noticed the issue early on and even the title examiner had picked up on it when researching for the ALTA. We sent copies of deeds, plats, older plats, etc. Finally convinced them. Then it went to another department that immediately pushed the stop button for the same thing ... It took months to get approvals.... And they haven't added the ghost parcel yet.
Me. "What's the difference?"
T.C. Carroll "It's the difference between right and wrong!"
"Then it went to another department that immediately pushed the stop button for the same thing ... It took months to get approvals.... And they haven't added the ghost parcel yet."
I lost my really good planner, then a group took over. One of my last plats looked like a code book and I couldn't ever seem to get approval to proceed. I finally got with the government attorney and asked if they really want all these notes on the plat. He didn't understand until I told him his department was signing off on the plat, and all this unnecessary stuff will put them on the hook, not the developer. The plat is forever, why pin it with code stuff when it changes every year. Next week all the notes were redlined off the plat. Seems they were only relevant for the preliminary process.............right!!
I surveyed that bit of the MAX line this winter.
It appeared on the GIS to be encroaching into city hall property so we have demanded that Trimet move it.
Have had quite a few surveys over the decades thanks to sloppy GIS information.
Unrelated to GIS, but, one time I had a good client call because his neighbor thought the middle of the driveway between the two houses was the property line. The neighbor had a deed to a tract 42 feet wide, with a 45-foot wide house on it and the center of driveway was about 30 feet north of that.
Most states have no requirement that boundary surveys be tied to geodetic reference system. Typically when it's brought up, PLSs will argue that adding a tie to a state plane coordinate system or adding Lat/Long data two or more boundary corners would be detrimental to the cadastre. Some say that it would increase pin cushioning as coordinates would take precedent over found monumentation. Other PLSs voice concerns over the ability of PLSs to correctly establish the coordinates in the first place. The point is, that in a majority of states and counties, the GIS tax map folks have to fit our surveys in jigsaw puzzle like fashion. It strikes me as odd that at a time when cementing a parcel to it's precise location on a given ellipsoid is remarkably simple, we as a group seem hostile to the idea. I don't doubt that there would be negative side affects, but I suspect they'd be far eclipsed by the value of having every boundary retracement and original survey professionally located on a defined ellipsoid.
@murphy I think you overestimate how helpful it would be. You'd still have guys scaling from locally determined points, multiple measurements on the same lines are still never the same, and you'd still have to jigsaw in thousands of surveys that pre-dated the idea of putting coordinates on surveys.
I do like the idea of getting rid of these custom coordinate systems some municipalities have come up with though.