First, a disclaimer, I am not a surveyor, however, I need to calculate lot sizes for appraisals I perform.
I am trying to figure out how to plot a deed by it's description. I have AutoCAD, yet I just cannot get it to work.
If anyone knows how to plot the site as described below, your help would be appreciated.
BEGINNING at the corner formed by the intersection of the northerly side of James Avenue as widened, with the westerly side of Little Street;
RUNNING THENCE Westerly along a line forming an interior angle of 102 degrees 23 minutes 55.5 seconds with the westerly side of Little Street and along the northerly side of James Avenue as widened, 1.49 feet, more or less, to a point;
THENCE Westerly along a line forming and interior angle of 173 degrees 39 minutes 10 seconds with the last mentioned course an along the northerly side of James Avenue as widened 198.59 feet;
THENCE Northerly along a line forming an interior angle of 90 degrees 0 minutes 0 seconds with the northerly side of James Avenue to the southwesterly side of lands now or formerly belonging to the Railroad Co., 134.11 feet;
THENCE Southeasterly on a line forming an interior angle of 67 degrees 23 minutes 54.5 seconds with the last mentioned course and along the southwesterly side of lands, now or formerly belonging to the Railroad Co., 222,29 feet, more or less, to the westerly side of Little Street;
THENCE Southerly along a line forming an interior angle of 106 degrees 33 minutes 00 seconds with the last mentioned course and along the westerly side of Little Street 48.79 feet, more or less, to the corner, the point or place of BEGINNING.
Without a reference bearing you can't get the corrrect rotation, but the shape does close and if you assume the second course is EW and the third course NS you'd get something like this, though the coordinates are assumed and random too. Lastly, some of those deed calls are to rail and road right of ways and so those distances would possibly vary from what the deed reads. This should get you close though.
Lot PNT# Northing Easting Description Bearing Distance
1 1 1881047.4818 6447575.3382 Calc S 83°39'10.00" W 1.490
1 2 1881047.3170 6447573.8574 Calc N 90°00'00" W 198.590
1 3 1881047.3170 6447375.2674 Calc N 00°00'00.00" W 134.110
1 4 1881181.4270 6447375.2674 Calc S 67°23'54.50" E 222.286
1 5 1881095.9982 6447580.4816 Calc S 06°03'05.50" W 48.788
1 1 1881047.4818 6447575.3382
Closure Error Distance> 0.00031 Error Bearing> N 25°09'22.42" E
Closure Precision> 1 in 1956249.5 Total Distance> 605.264
LOT AREA: 18630 SQ FT OR 0.4277 ACRES
Another complication is that sometimes the property owner owns to the center of the road, and the public enjoys a easement or right-of-way (ROW) over the portion of the land that is used as a road. In other cases, some level of government owns the roadbed in fee simple. In the former case, there are two areas, the entire lot and the part of the lot that is free of ROW. Deeds and surveyors are often not consistent about how this issue is treated, even in the same neighborhood.
An alternative to a soon to be VERY expensive software package in which you are only using , maybe 10%, is this:
http://www.greenbriergraphics.com/
You take a copy of the deed as a word. doc, open it in Word, follow the package instructions and it will draw everything for you and give you an accurate closure report. OR you can hand enter the description as you are now trying to do. NO AutoCAD required.
Not everyone can use AutoCAD. This is a cheaper solution just made for appraisers and legal eagles.
Thanks, I see that it is plottable, although I couldn't do it. Can you explain the process please. I need to plot deeds on a regular basis as we do not rely on the tax maps. Also, do you know of a good book or course where I can learn.
Thanks!
Plotting Deeds - Another Option
> An alternative to a soon to be VERY expensive software package in which you are only using , maybe 10%, is this:
>
>> http://www.greenbriergraphics.com/
>
> You take a copy of the deed as a word. doc, open it in Word, follow the package instructions and it will draw everything for you and give you an accurate closure report. OR you can hand enter the description as you are now trying to do. NO AutoCAD required.
>
> Not everyone can use AutoCAD. This is a cheaper solution just made for appraisers and legal eagles.
For proofing my maps (running closure/area checks), I use Plat Pronto Basic from BW Muncy. A rather small learning curve, great help/manual and the price is right.
Matt
> Thanks, I see that it is plottable, although I couldn't do it. Can you explain the process please. I need to plot deeds on a regular basis as we do not rely on the tax maps. Also, do you know of a good book or course where I can learn.
>
> Thanks!
Part of the problem is that it is interior angles that are listed instead of basic bearings and distances. I find that interior angle of descriptions to be a very localized animal. I don't know of anywhere in VA or WV that does it that way.
If you need simple bearings and distances, you might consider this that I found.
http://www.tractplotter.com/
Quick and dirty, and apparently you can enter various forms of length measurement units. If you had interior angles, you'd have to convert those. And that's not that complicated.
Carl
What might help you more than anything is to sit down with someone like a high school math teacher and learn about geometry and trigonometry. Not a one hour experience, but a forty hour experience or more. Because, until you understand the mechanics you have no true understanding. All the various software options that are being mentioned are nice, but only if you know enough to know when you are getting bad answers because of errors you may put into the process. This is critical because you will be encountering a wide variety of terms and procedures that are currently foreign to you. This example uses interior angles. The next may use exterior angles. Then one will come along citing azimuths. More commonly you will encounter bearings. Next will come a circular section of boundary to mix with all the straight lines. Your question then will be how to handle that. Your example appears to close, but you need to know the level of error to calculate if a description does not close precisely. That is very common.
You state that you have AUTOCAD, but you can't get it to work. There is no problem with the program. The problem is a current lack of knowledge of how to translate words on paper into a series of instructions for the software to perform. Self tutorial is a flawed process. Find an instructor to get you to the level of performance you need to be able to achieve.
We live in a world where we think accessing information is knowledge. That is not the case. Working repeatedly with specific information and discovering that 99 percent of the time we arrive at the correct answer is knowledge. Knowing when that one percent of error has occurred is the most important part.
You have come to the correct place to access information. The challenge is to sort through it and correctly determine which set of guidance will get you to your goal. Good luck.
Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime.
Plotting Deeds - Might want to check out Deed-Chek as well
He might also want to check out AGT's Deed-Chek.
I did it using the Map Traverse module of Copan, free software (see underhill.ca/software/copan-windows).
Because interior angles, not, bearings, are given, i had to build up the traverse mete-by-mete, saving the coordinates as i went, and entering each direction as 'backsight minus interior angle'. (If we were traversing counter-clockwise, we'd add interior angle to backsight.) Also, i assumed (because no basis of bearing is given) Little Street as being exactly north, unlike PHD (who made James Avenue exactly west).
The raw data:
1
2 -102.23555 1.49
3 2,1-173.3910 198.59
4 3,2 -90.00 134.11
5 4,3 -67.23545 222.29
1 5,4-106.33 48.79
The plot:
The results:
1) Map Traverse Results [1 - 1]
Leg Count 5
Total Distance 605.27
Coordinate Misclosure
N -0.00 Dist 0.00
E 0.00 Brng S53°56'51"E
Relative precision 1 : 122190
NB: No Adjustment
Start or Curve
Bearing Distance To Point Code Northing Easting
1 1000.00 1000.00
S77°36'05"W 1.49 2 999.68 998.54
S83°56'55"W 198.59 3 978.74 801.06
N 6°03'05"W 134.11 4 1112.11 786.92
S73°27'00"E 222.29 5 1048.79 1000.00
South 48.79 1 1000.00 1000.00
Area 18630 (sq. units)
I agree with all you say about the complexity/variability of solving such problems. But why should a high school math teacher be better than a surveyor? Teachers are probably already under paid and should not work for free and, while they'll understand the math underpinnings, they won't necessarily know surveying specifics well.
Holy cow, holy sh!_t, you were no help at all. Regardless of your estimating of my capabilities, I will teach myself the basics of plotting deeds. The problem is I am so busy at work right now, and I don't have the time.
I guess you are the forum's negative poster. Don't worry, someone has to be that member.
To everyone else, thanks for the help.
