I would tell him to go ahead and write it and send you a copy when he is finished with it for review. Red line the heck out of it and send it back suggesting that he stick to engineering and leave description preparation to those qualified to do so.
If he writes a good legal though, offer him a job...
> As a dual registrant, offer to help prepare it for him, but be aware of the liability you are assuming by helping with this. Of course, this depends on the size and complexity of the description.
>
> One more thing... never refer to them as 'legal' descriptions... that implies practicing law w/o licensure. Always call them property or boundary or easement descriptions, something that does not imply legal stature.
>
> Doug
I agree that you might refrain from calling them "legal" descriptions, but not your reason. You write a description of land, and if/when it gets attached to a deed, and the deed gets recorded, it then becomes the "legal" description, whether it was written by a lawyer or not.
I might write a land description (in Colorado a 'Property Description') that I put on my plat of a property I surveyed, but it is not a "legal description" of that land. The description that was on the conveying document is the "legal description". If the property description I wrote gets attached to a deed, that description then becomes the legal description.
Asking for help places that engineer on the upper tiers of his profession. He is worthy of obtaining assistance from any surveyor.
jud
If you're helping him out, I would suggest strongly stressing a couple of things. One is that the description must be findable on the ground. (Point out that how can you tell if the person is inside the easement if they don't know where the easement is?)
The other thing is that if he is actually writing the easement and not just the land description, then he needs to know that the easement must have a purpose. (Conversely, if it were meant to be a fee-simple transfer of property it can't be for a "purpose".) That might be putting it too simple, and I'm not a lawyer, but they want to make sure someone doesn't tranfer fee-simple land if they didn't mean to, or vise versa.
I have to agree....
I've known a few engineers who just "fudge" their own
descriptions for easements.
Called one on it once.... was told that surveying was simple
and that a "trained monkey" could do it.
An engineer like that playing the odds on not getting caught
and having liability for a junk description?
Priceless..........
Tell him to write it like this...
...easement, as shown on plan such and such, recorded with such and such...
The end.
-V
What makes you think it is okay for an engineer to do this in GA?????
Ask the GA board to rule on it..... LOL, "the GA board?!?!" I crack myself up.
Sheriff Buford T. Justice in HOT PURSUIT of description writing Engineers 😉