Without them there would not be a job opportunity for me. Then again, my client may be the neighborhood jerk.
The neighbor on the north insists on mowing all the grass between the two houses. That would be great if he didn't blow the green, sticky clippings all over the side of the white house and it's lovely adornments every time he mows. He can't seem to grasp that this is a bad thing.
The neighbor on the south is a screaming, maniacal witch who claims the client's dog keeps pooping on the first six inches of HER property.
Enough is enough. Time to build an eight-foot high privacy fence. Also build a driveway as close to the new fence on the south side as possible. The first 27 years at this home went smoothly with nice neighbors. The last year, with new neighbors, has been unbearable to the point that it is time to donate money to me to rescue him from the evils around him.
mowing wars
I was hired once to settle a "pecker war" that was raging between two neighbors..old neighbors..like in their 80s.
It was two cul-de-sac lots and the line between them was a "radial" line extending from the center of the 'sac. There was no fence, front or rear, between the properties. One of the gents mowed regularly, but always mowed parallel to his house and "gored" his neighbor's turf by fifteen or twenty feet between the houses. The neighbor (my client) had a good idea of where the line was and detested his neighbor mowing part of his yard...
It was a pretty cut and dried survey, the pins were all in. I don't think I even charged the guy, I was out there working on some "bigger fish".
Anyway, the two idiots wouldn't ever let me get a word in edgewise. I had to work with both of them snippin' and scratchin' at each other right over my shoulder. I set some pin flags on line and suggested they set something permanent on the line they both would agree (?!) on.
They were still at it as I drove off. I bet both those guys were good neighbors to each other until they retired. They didn't have anything better to do than bitch, piss and moan at each other. It was hilarious.
Few years back I was doing a ton of work in this particular group of subdivisions, an entire summer's worth. I had it dialed in. I start to scratch around for this one particular corner next to one particularly immaculate house and lawn when the owner comes rushing out in a huff demanding to know what I'm doing. The lot next to his place was undeveloped and I casually noted how his immaculate lawn and landscaping extending half way across it. 'Looking for your property corner Sir'. 'Well, that's not where it is, it's over there', indicating the extent of his lawn. I smiled and swept my schonstedt over the computed point and got a ring, be it deep. At this point the fellow is getting furious and neighbors are pouring out to see what the commotion is about. 'That must be a piece of old junk buried there', he says in a huff. I dig down 1 1/2' to find a perfect rebar within 0.1' of computed. 'There's your corner' I tell him. Meanwhile a very large colored lady is jumping up and down behind me screaming over my shoulder, 'I told you! I told you! You been stealing that land!' at the old man.
'My work is done here folks, Y'all have a nice day.'. 😀
Best one I ever had was two old ladies fighting over a flower bed. And we're talking a few tenths, half foot at most. Meet the 70+ client, get to work. About 2 minutes later the 70+ neighbor comes out without a word, but with a shovel. About thirty seconds after that out comes the client with her shovel. I hopped straight in the van, told them they could find the corner with two shovels faster than I could with one, drove away.
Just, WOW!🙁
Years ago my then employer was retained by an elderly woman to survey her lot and stake one property line w/ POLs, which we did, produced a map and waited for payment.
Fast forward a month and boss gets a notice that this nice elderly woman had filed a complaint with the NYSED accusing him of negligence in the performance of said survey, and that he should bring all his documentation for a review by the disciplinary dudes. SO, he shows up at the appointed time and place, and there are the two surveyors she had hired before us, unbeknown to us.
It shook out that all 3 agreed within a tenth or so of the line's location, but this woman insisted that while the front and rear corners were in the correct location, the boundary between was actually curved such that it included the massive ancient lilac that her neighbor had been trying to prune back into some semblance of control.
You can't, just plain can't, argue with a woman whose mind is made up, and win...
SS
"curved" straight lines
I've been in the jaws of that mentality before...it's an exercise in futility.
Had a client that owned a 40 acre tract. We performed a boundary for him. He was pleased (all the corners were actually existing) and he also wanted "a line staked" along one of his side lot lines.
Both ends of the line were upland and there was about a 600' stretch in the middle that was nice flat pasture with mature pecan trees. All but one (the scrawniest) was actually off his property.
This was a fairly intelligent individual, but he could not wrap his brain around the fact 'his' pecan trees weren't on his property. He was adamant "that can't be right".
Even though he agreed with both ends of the line (you could stand at the front and look STRAIGHT down the lath to the rear corner 1300' away), "the line must move or something by the trees"...
With physical evidence and demonstrative staking, he would still not believe the straight lath line was correct. It was like arguing with a post. He was hot.
After a month or so his wife sent us a check with a polite thank you note.
I got hired to survey a small lot in a platted subdivision. All the corners were in and checked well. As I'm setting up the instrument, the neighbor walks up behind me and says in a very loud voice, "What's that?!" without so much as an "Excuse me". I slowly turned around and told her it was a surveying instrument. In the course of the survey I found her fence to be about 3 feet on my client in a 1/4 to 1/3 acre subdivision. The woman says "I already moved that fence once". I asked why she didn't move it to the property line. Then she tells me my client's property doesn't go back as far as the plat indicates. Then she tells me the lot beside her isn't part of the subdivision and "doesn't belong to anyone". I went inside her fence and stated setting line stakes. As she was telling me they were wrong, and "this is where those people down at the county said it goes", I told her if she pulls them she's going to get my bill for restake. None of this made her very happy, but my client seemed to enjoy it very much.
Afterwards I apologized to my client and said I should have been more professional. He said he didn't care, the relationship couldn't have been made any worse than it was already. He already knew where the line was, but needed a surveyor to say so.
One of the neighbors of a commercial site I surveyed was a smallish but very ornery guy with an ugly knife scar on his face. He was unhappy because a little bush he had planted at the edge of his yard fell about a foot into the surveyed parcel.
I called my client over. He understood perfectly well what was going on and what to do. "No problem," he said, "Your bush can stay there. It's not in my way." The neighbor was even more unhappy if anything. "Aww, you're too easy," he snarled.
