I was hired by a recent buyer, from California, to survey the following property description:
beginning at the NE corner of the S half of the SE quarter of the NW quarter of section blah, blah, blah; thence south 330 feet to the point of beginning; thence west 360 feet; thence south 110 feet; thence east 360 feet; thence north 110 feet to the point of beginning; except the E 30 feet for Central County Road.
In my research, I find a survey of this property, done in 2006. There are a few minor errors; his bearing on the west line of the NW quarter says SW when it should be SE and he found a brass disk (with a dimple) at the NE corner of the SE quarter of the NW quarter; 0.5' south and 0.6' west of the calculated split and rejected it. And then the big one: I find all 4 of his corners; they all look undisturbed; and they are all 1.5' west and 0.15' north of where they should be; and where he said that he set them. I checked my work six ways from Sunday; I have the utmost confidence in my work and we agree, with in an acceptable tolerance, on the section location and break down. (Other than the rejection of a perfectly good 1/16 corner) It looks like he just had an error in his control on site and didn't check it.
I have never met this guy, but I know who he is. I called him this morning and left a message. I don't know if he'll call me back; I think he's retired or semi-retired.
So what would you do; assuming he doesn't call you back; or does call you back; holds up his hand; touching his finger to his thumb and says: This is how many F's I give...
TIA
Dougie
EDIT-I should qualify this a little further; in that this kind of description is fairly common in this area and there's a good chance the 2006 surveyor is the first surveyor to survey this particular property.
I'd like to know about the monument's relationship to occupation before answering in full.
But you've determined a boundary in the State of Washington and found a material discrepancy in the record. You will need to do an ROS.
Dougie,
Can you tie this survey in with a conveyance of some sort? You may have to trace back a deed or twelve to develop some historical chain. The good thing is that you probably have a title company to help with that. I agree that the construction of the description is typical of what would have been crafted by a title plant or escrow company at some time. Of course have a look at the adjacent descriptions.
Be persistant with getting a hold of the previous surveyor, ten years is not a long time; even my memory is good that far back and I certainly would have a folder full of information about the survey and the field book. If he is retired, you could ask for his records if for no other reason than you could document the issue with certainty. I wish more surveyors would call (me) seeking the truth.
File a record of survey and include a naritive about what you found and why your map deviates from the 2006 map.
Might I suggest a vacation? Your disparaging remark about your client (a Californian) and anticipated response from Brand X leaves me thinking so.
Daniel Ralph, post: 390669, member: 8817 wrote: Might I suggest a vacation? Your disparaging remark about your client (a Californian) and anticipated response from Brand X leaves me thinking so.
Sorry about that Dan; I meant no disrespect...I could've left off the fact about the client being from CA; I've been doing a lot of work, lately, for people from out of town and 90% of them are from 2 states to the south. And as far as brand X goes; this isn't the first time I've been down this road; all of the responses thus far, are of the raspberry variety.
This was generally my response:
Maybe I do need a vacation...
I've checked all the adjoiners, their adjoiners and deeds back to creation; the deeded description isn't the problem. We both agree (on paper) that the math puts both of us in the same spot.
It's weird that all 4 of his corners are a foot and a half west. I might have a little trouble sleeping, if it was north or south, but his front (east) corners are a foot and a half west of the right-of-way line. Can you come up with another reason, other than; he has error in his control and didn't make appropriate checks?
Dougie
Kinda sounds like someone went out there and did another "here" shot to set the corners.
James
Are there street monuments? How wide is the right-of-way? The 1.5' westing has me wondering if whoever staked it did some onsite cogo and staked an offset from the street mons for a 33' wide ROW rather than a 30' and proceeded from there.
(a "two-rod road" = 2x16.5')
A difference of 0.15' would fit under Jobo's hat and is not a big concern. Prism error? Centering error? Difference between recorded and measured between the two monuments?
I'm assuming they used street monuments, from how far away are you guys actually bringing in the control? Section corners or street monuments nearby?
It kinda points to an office/field disconnect where what got recorded isn't what got staked. If what got recorded is in complete agreement with the plat or the record and with no "record/measured" comparison, it's anyone's guess what happened in the field.
Here are all my other thoughts as I got to the above
Did he set the corners or his party chief? Is he an optics guy or a GPS guy?
Sounds very aliquot-parts-ish. Did he and his party chief use the same section breakdown? 360 feet from which imaginary line?
What was their staking procedure? Maybe they fatfingered the coordinates for their initial occupation and only shot the backsight for azimuth?
Does the 2006 survey include record and measured? Bearings other than cardinal?
Is it rural woods or manicured lawns?
Is there any obvious reliance upon the 2006 monuments he set?
Is there a back fence 1.5' W into the adjoiner?
Do the monuments or the 2006 ROS itself appear anywhere else in the record since then?
It's been more than 8 years, has repose tolled?
Thanks for posting the poll Radar, hope this entertains.
Well James, you bring up a few good points. The only street mons are the section corners. The center quarter was there, once, but now it's gone. Like I said, we agree, at least on paper, as to how the section corners relate to each other (so do 2 other surveyors) I used a best fit of the 3 surveys to calculate my center quarter position.
The right of way is 60' that's why the description excepts out the east 30'.
We can speculate all we want; about how he screwed it up. It still doesn't change the fact that he screwed up.
I don't think he has a crew, maybe a helper, part time.
Thanks for all the responses so far.
Only 2 votes:
Nobody else wants to speculate on what do do?
Are the incorrect bearings simply typographical / scriveners' errors or are his stake points calculated from them too?
RADAR, post: 390660, member: 413 wrote: NE corner of the S half of the SE quarter of the NW quarter of section
If we're coming from the N 1/4 towards the NE corner of the S half of the SE quarter of the NW quarter of section, that's roughly 1320' + 660' = 1980' = 660 yards.
Approximating that one minute of angle is roughly 1 inch at 100 yards, and we have 18 inches of error at 660 yards. Half that is 9 inches, so to get minutes, 9/6.6 = 1.3636 minutes or roughly 82 seconds or 0d1m22s. Is the bearing on the west line of the NW qtr something like s00-01-22e? Sounds like he held the west line and calculated his stake coordinates with the flipped bearing, and they fall short of the East line of the NW qtr. by that amount.
Another wild guess. Show the contestants what they won, Dougie !
Good morning,
I apologize for my satire. It was late in the day for me and the sun had worn me out. I voted this morning.
After reflection and not that it matters. I wonder if the section that you are working in has a KCAS breakdown and if so did the WPA traverse through the center or not? If they did, there may be a traverse monument near where your site is which was used by Brand X to get onto that system. This may be indicated by what was labeled in the Meridian or Basis of Bearings statement and that procedure is/was common up here. If you suspect this, then perhaps a simple transposition of numbers from a KCAS (or any for that matter) worksheet coordinate may produce an error that you are finding. Those traverse points are a valuable resource that are quickly disappearing.
I have called Brand X (probably not this one) several times over the course of my tenure and upon reflection the probability of gaining a response is difficult to gage. However, if the judge asks you if you did........
KCAS section breakdowns appear to use the mathematical center of section, with no mention of the old stone that is usually there ...
This is in Pierce County...
Daniel Ralph, post: 390773, member: 8817 wrote: I apologize for my satire.
No need to apologize Dan; just another day in the life....:)
If the 10 years has elapsed, and/or something in the way of occupation has occurred in reliance upon the 2006 irons, then you may have an agreed boundary in spite of the erroneous placement. File an ROS showing the updated dimensions.
If these pins are just out in the forest, and the 10 years has not yet elapsed, then you should probably pull them, set your own, and file an ROS showing your pins and referencing the positions of the old.
I agree with Mark that it comes down to whether there was any reliance on the erroneous monuments, and per the case he attached, whether the points were obvious so that a reasonable landowner would have known of their location.
As to pulling the other surveyor's monuments, I agree it would be the best thing to do to avoid confusion, but there are a couple other things to consider. First and again, does there appear to have been any recognition and reliance on the erroneous monuments? Second, do you have the permission of the affected landowners? Third, make sure that you have enough redundancies in your own work to ensure no blunders (and it sounds like you do), and that there isn't a possible reasonable alternate analysis of the evidence that supports the locations of the monuments (and it sounds like you've probably eliminated that), and that you include enough information on your map and leave enough physical evidence in the field to reliably re-establish those points if the need should arise.
The 10 year old monuments are best evidence of what the seller owns and intends to sell. The neighborhood has apparently been fine with the monuments for 10 years. What is your job? To show what the first surveyor did or what he should have done? Record your findings as measured as and recorded as and leave peace in the valley.
