A major contractor/construction company (with whom we have completed dozens of projects) has recently requested a proposal from us to complete a survey for a client. The particulars of the survey are pretty straight forward and I believe any questions that would arrive could easily be solved through communications with all parties involved. My concern is the scope of the project itself...
The structure is a multi-story building in the historic district within one of our major cities. The building is being renovated to have multiple condominiums per floor throughout the various floors of the building, along with common areas such as a parking garage, lobby, hallways, elevators, etc. etc.
We have completed surveys of condos before but all have been single story structures or, at most, a couple of floors in situations that the individual units were multi levels still with single party walls between each condo.
I am confident that we can complete the field work of the survey without complications on our part. Where my concern manifests is I have never platted nor described condominium survey to this magnitude. To elaborate, the complexity of multiple units on multiple floors with various common areas, walls and more throughout is taking a bit of head scratching to wrap my brain around. I am attempting to get some light bulbs to go off in the grey matter that is floating around in my head, haha...
I would really like to see some possible examples from other surveyors that have completed such projects in the past. I believe seeing a few plats, descriptions and other examples would help me establish my approach to provide the best possible final product to the client. Can anyone help this head scratching surveyor out? All suggestions, examples, and information is welcome!
Depending on the your state's specific rules, obviously, it's usually a site plan showing the lot boundary, building footprint, common areas, unit parking spaces, etc. Then there will be unit plans, showing every room in each unit, dimensioned, and will be labeled by floor/unit. You'll need another sheet that shows each floor, with hallways and unit designations shown.
You have 4 main items to designate in a Condominium Project (WV calls it a Declaration Plan).
Project Boundary
Units
Common Areas
Limited Common Areas
Are you basing the dimensions on Plans or are you measuring every unit? You shouldn't have to describe any units individually, that should be explained in detail in the Declarations along with the CAs and LCAs. Those need to be drafted by a lawyer familiar with the condominium process. You'll have to meet with the client to finalize where the CA and LCA areas are and then designate those areas with dimensions and labels.
Our code is 2 fold. We have to adhere to our Subdivision Platting Code and then the Condo itself is directly tied to the Declarations.
As with anything else, every state or agency will be a little different.
This is one we did about 10 years ago for an conversion of an apartment building into condominiums. Air space is really what the future buyer is purchasing, so we had to show a plan view of each floor and an elevation view. The elevation view is mostly to show the vertical space for each floor. The first sheet was simply a survey of the property showing the boundary and common areas, with some notes about purposes of common areas. Wall and ceiling heights can get tricky in older buildings. I think on some of them we just had to average the wall thickness due to bowing and settling.
If I were to do another one, I would probably leave out some of the interior unit walls, since they would be entirely owned by the unit.
Thanks for the information guys and especially for the sample .pdf (@Moosetjmj)
moosetmj, post: 414079, member: 6761 wrote: This is one we did about 10 years ago for an conversion of an apartment building into condominiums. Air space is really what the future buyer is purchasing, so we had to show a plan view of each floor and an elevation view. The elevation view is mostly to show the vertical space for each floor. The first sheet was simply a survey of the property showing the boundary and common areas, with some notes about purposes of common areas. Wall and ceiling heights can get tricky in older buildings. I think on some of them we just had to average the wall thickness due to bowing and settling.
If I were to do another one, I would probably leave out some of the interior unit walls, since they would be entirely owned by the unit.
Looks similar to the ones that I've seen. Maybe wouldn't dimension to the 0.01', though.
Condominium plat examples Book 735, Page 9 & Book 1228, Page 4 of Maricopa county records.
