Me: Hi, this is Brian…
Hi. How far is Montague from Happy Camp? I need to find a surveyor close to Happy Camp.
Well, on a good day, I can make it in an hour and a half.
Oh that’s too far… I need to find someone closer.
I’m sorry ma’am; I think that all of the practicing surveyors in Siskiyou County are in Yreka or Montague.
Well, I’m going to call the Assessor’s office and see if I can find one in Fort Jones.
OK- CLICK!
About an hour and a half later…
Ring-Ring!
Me: Hi, this is Brian…
Hi, my name is *****. Can you give me a “ballpark” price to survey my property in Happy Camp?
Well, I wouldn’t be able to without any information about the parcel. I need to research survey records and maybe pull some deeds to determine what it would take to perform the survey.
And how much does that cost?
I don’t typically charge anything to determine a cost to do a survey. I may have to get more than a few deeds, and I will want to charge you my cost for them, which is $5 per deed. Maps are usually free.
May I ask why you need the survey?
I have property across the road that my neighbor parks his junk cars on and I would like him to get rid of them.
I understand.
Just to warn you: he is a real nut-job! I have had run-ins with him in the past. Yeah, when I bought the place, my realtor told me that my property went across the road, she just didn’t tell me how far. I hired a contractor and he looked at it and said the same thing. He just kinda pointed in the general direction of the creek and said “down there somewhere”.
OK, if you can give me your Assessor’s Parcel Number, I could get started and get back to you on Monday with a cost proposal…
Oh, sure. Here you go…
Well after I pull her deed, pull the township plat, look at the quad map and assessor’s plats, I scratch my head and dive into deciphering the deed. This description was poorly written and had some errors regarding fractional portions of the section. It attempted to describe portions of a section lying Southerly of a line and then tried to except out another portion. It looked as if someone had the description of the parent parcel and the description of a conveyance out of that parcel and tried to cut and paste them together to describe the remainder of the parent parcel. I was able to run the deed out over the quad map and determine a rough configuration, which did not include anything on the other side of the road as previously professed by the owner.
I figured I call this gal and break the great news: She doesn’t have to pay for a survey because the crazy neighbor’s cars are on his property.
After explaining to her that the deed description contained an exception, calling to the centerline of the road and that the deed did not grant title to anything Easterly of the road, she quickly dismissed my opinion as nonsense and hung-up.
It’s amazing how much credence a layman will give a realtor or contactor regarding matters they have no business opining about and shun the opinion of a professional.
A FREE OPINION APPEARS TO HAVE LITTLE VALUE!
I did the same as you years ago. If I were to return to private practice now I would charge for work like that. Maybe you need to start charging for initial research and review. Talk to a few local lawyers or title companies and see what they would charge for investing similar time in researching a property.
Contractors provide estimates to bid for a job. Lawyers will state flat fees for simple fill in the forms type work and hourly fees for anything as complex as what you did. Tell her it would be $X.xx per hour to evaluate the documents, provide a written evaluation of the documents and an estimated cost of survey. Minimum 1 hour for the work. Suddenly the opinion has value!!
She has a relationship with the realtor and the contractor. You are just some guy on the phone who delivered bad news.
A FREE OPINION APPEARS TO HAVE LITTLE VALUE!
Ain't these loonies fun? Had one call me three days ago. We have now had about five phone conversations and I have received three e-mails including photos of how she wants to split the property. She told me the neighbor had a survey done just last year. I suggested she check with the neighbor to get a copy of what was done so that we would have something solid to start with. Eventually, she calls me back, tells me she has talked with everyone except that neighbor, as she really doesn't want to talk with him, and has found another company that has copies of the surveys I would need. They are even willing to share them because they can't get there for a month and I could get there sometime next week. I've shared info with that company before so it's no big deal. Then she calls me this morning as says she has found a different company yet that swears they can get out there, without the other surveys, and have it all done and delivered by Thursday. She hopes I won't be upset.
Why would I be upset? I'd already figured out what a PITA she was going to be.
A FREE OPINION APPEARS TO HAVE LITTLE VALUE!
Your absolutly right. I probably wouldn't have gone that far with it other that the legal was so hammered, I just ran it out in ACAD.
:good:
She would have treated you different, if she had paid you, say, 1500 bucks for that bit of info.
N
A FREE OPINION APPEARS TO HAVE LITTLE VALUE!
Why is she still calling/emailing you about the progress? That's a bit of a red flag there. 😉
then you would have seen 1500 worth of her best nut job self
i will spend a little time investigating before i prepare a formal proposal
you want to know what you are getting into before you start
As much as I would have liked to have been compensated for my time (about an hour) and professional opinion, little bergs in Siskiyou County like Happy Camp are like the tomb in Raiders of the Losk Ark, dark and unassuming, until you throw a torch down in the hole and find it's crawling with asps!
> As much as I would have liked to have been compensated for my time (about an hour) and professional opinion, little bergs in Siskiyou County like Happy Camp are like the tomb in Raiders of the Losk Ark, dark and unassuming, until you throw a torch down in the hole and find it's crawling with asps!
True in many rural areas. Once had an Ohio county engineer (by law P.E. and P.S.) tell me the state minimum new parcel description standards, requiring a survey, would never be enforced in his county. His reasoning, "Most of the land in the county was not worth the cost of a survey." Deeds with one distance and three calls to adjoining property owners were commonly accepted. Pull the adjoining deeds and get more of the same.
My Ring-Ring was from a landscape architect wanting a copy of the cad file of a parcel I did a topo on over 6 years ago..wanted to know how much to send the file over. I told him that we would need to do an update and it would be xxx dollars and I would draw up a contract with 50% retainer required. He emails me the contact info and says that his client is in a rush and wants to just buy my previous work now and if the project goes ahead we can do the rest later. So I tell him that I will go out this weekend and verify the site, make sure there arent any changes and send him the file monday but since this is a rush weekend thing, he will have to pay the same cost and 100% by yesterday. I am not holding my breath.