Does the phrasing in the deeds of lots along a county road with a currently 50 foot easement have the effect of keeping the property corners in the middle of the road per the original 30 foot easement in the 1930s when it states the common legal catch all clause --
"Subject to... any prior easements, etc." The previous property owner states that a large metal rod was driven down into the middle of the road and locates the corner. When doing research on the "chain of title" there is an error in the deed numbers (a number missing) which prevents moving into the deed previous by surveyors who do not want to go back to the original deed and work forward (too time consuming). The recent surveys use the edge of the 50 foot right of way as the "corners" and the original first deed states from the middle of the road. If the dimensions are maintained through time that means that there is a 25 foot gore/gap due to the easement and an additional 25 feet taken out of the larger "senior rights" property. How does this get unraveled? Should the back lot lines be moved forward 25 feet to the middle of the road? Wonder if anyone has any insight into how to determine this before someone puts up a fence to "claim": their surveyor "granted" land?? Thank you for your answers!!
In many states the rural roads are an easement with the fee ownership going to the aliquot (e.g. section) line near the center of the road.?ÿ?ÿ If there has been no fee acquisition by a governing body that may be your case.?ÿ I have seen monumentation set both in the road and at the edge of the ROW for the same property, and also monumentation only at one or the other.?ÿ I believe Iowa exempts the road easement from the taxed acreage, but I have seen some county GIS systems fail to distinguish this.
(IANAS, so double check me)
There is no pat answer to your question. To determine the boundaries of your property I would want read your deed description and the descriptions of all your adjoiners. I'd like to read the description of the parent parcel, before your lot and those of your adjoiners lots were created.?ÿ I'd like to see any available survey maps. I'd want to know something about the customary local practice.?ÿ ?ÿAnd I'd be looking at the dates on all these. In short, sometimes descriptions start on the right of way line and sometimes they start at the road centerline. In my area, in general, very old descriptions use the latter form and newer ones use the former. Your area may be different.?ÿ ?ÿ
This is a no fee paid easement under the original "road act" of 1802. The original deed of the 1930s states the middle of the road where the metal rod monument does exist per the previous owner and later more recent surveyors who did not go back to the beginning placed the corners on the edge of the current 50 foot easement edge as the easier solution. With the "Subject to.... " clause in the various later and following deeds, should not the corners be returned to the middle of the road and 25 feet added to the back senior property??ÿ
What makes placing the corners at the ROW the "easier" solution? It really is a matter of the ROW being held in fee or as an easement. What is a "fee paid" easement?
@big-d-2 probably not. ?ÿRe-read Mark & Bill??s comments carefully.
It would help get better answers to know what state this is in.
There is also a common law principle in play here, that may be affected by court decisions in your state, or legislative acts (statutes) may have altered the common law principle. I'm referring to linear monuments, such as rivers, roads, stone walls, etc. You should look this up as it applies in your state.
The presumption is the centerline is the boundary.
The Deed description??s primary function is to identify which tract is the subject matter of Deed. Boundaries are a secondary function and rights can carry forward even though subsequent title transfers do not mention them.
A Deed transfers or purports to transfer title of the subject matter from Grantor to Grantee. The examination of what title was transferred is strictly limited to the four corners of the Deed (and others within the chain of title) but the examination of the boundaries of the subject matter requires a broader investigation into record evidence and physical evidence, extrinsic evidence is not only allowed it is often required.
It is most likely that the boundary is the road centerline but as others have said a complete investigation should include the title and survey history in case there is something that overcomes the general information above.
It sounds like you have retraced the chain. I know some title people that would advise the owners to do a quiet title action to resolve the issue. I just finished one,
I don't know how expensive it ended up being but I recommended not doing it and simply take the property. They disagreed and now the title is "clean" for sure. I felt it wasn't needed, but I'm not a lawyer.?ÿ
That was for a stream, this is for a road.
Consult the title people/lawyer involved. Tell them what you know, show them the chain and let them continue the research and come to a decision.?ÿ
In most states either the courts or statute addresses this. In most states the burden to prove that a strip under a road was left out of a conveyance is substantial. The assumption is that the grantor did not intended to retain a strip of land that is useless on its own.?ÿ
The details of course vary by state and by the particular facts in each case.?ÿ
In many areas is is common practice to monument the ROW and not the boundary in the middle of the road for practical reasons. In this case the monuments act as witness corners and help the landowners understand where they can develop and/or exclude the public.?ÿ
Need to find out what interest the government has in the right of way.
@lurker It is a easement that the county did not pay anyone for. AKA "fee paid". The ROW edge corners increase the lot sizes.
The day of creation deed has the boundary corner (as was standard of the 1930s) being the mid point in the road easement (now increased up to 50 feet as the current standard easement through a property for county. It is now 33 feet for township). The road gets paved of course and widened in ROW over time. If a ROW edge "corner" is used (or is it a "witness corner" 25 feet from the road center?), will the lot keep "growing" with additional increases of the easement? What happened to the now 25 foot strip under the road? Did it get "reassigned" by default back to the senior property that surrounds the road and the smaller home lots? Surveyors (as in this case) do simple "deed stake outs" and do not see the need for asking someone for a complex and involved "retracement" when they are only charging someone $500. This leads owners to believe that what they own per what is on their deed is the whole story. This type of possible consumer fraud complete with the expected "pin cushion" corners, leads to boundary disputes. Surveyors in this type of scenario wont even indicate a line goes through a building if their is a mistake from a past survey. They just figure that it is now over 21 years so let those pesky neighbors fight over "adverse possession" if they want to. Perhaps this is what was meant by "easier".
If a ROW edge "corner" is used (or is it a "witness corner" 25 feet from the road center?), will the lot keep "growing" with additional increases of the easement?
The lot is the lot. The easement, right-of-way, road, etc. may increase or decrease in size, or get extinguished or abandoned, revert, etc., but the lot remains the same.
What happened to the now 25 foot strip under the road? Did it get "reassigned" by default back to the senior property that surrounds the road and the smaller home lots?
This has already been answered upthread. Generally the presumption is that the intent was to grant to centerline of road. It can be proved otherwise, and state/federal case law have an impact too, but that's where the practice of surveying tends to meet the practice of law, and things are not always black and white. In other words, not all title issues can be resolved by a survey.
Surveyors (as in this case) do simple "deed stake outs" and do not see the need for asking someone for a complex and involved "retracement" when they are only charging someone $500. This leads owners to believe that what they own per what is on their deed is the whole story. This type of possible consumer fraud complete with the expected "pin cushion" corners, leads to boundary disputes.
I thought we were talking about monumenting CL vs ROW/easement line, not "consumer fraud". If someone believes that a surveyor has not met minimum standards, they should lodge a complaint with the state board.
Surveyors in this type of scenario wont even indicate a line goes through a building if their is a mistake from a past survey. They just figure that it is now over 21 years so let those pesky neighbors fight over "adverse possession" if they want to. Perhaps this is what was meant by "easier".
There are usually statutes and/or regulations that govern minimum standards for boundary surveys, and most of them include showing any possible encroachments and/or improvements within a certain distance of the determined line. If that is the case in your state, and you believe that a surveyor has not met standards, it's probably a good start to remind them of it. If they refuse to comply, then again, it's time to lodge a complaint.
It sounds like the state has an easement for the ROW.?ÿ If that's the case then the landowners abutting the road simply lose the use of that land even though they still own it.
Like others have said there may be other factors at play since rules vary from one region to another, but I think this is the gist of what's going on in your situation.
If the County took a 25' Road Easement on each side of the road, the property still runs to the centerline of the road but the 25' Roadway easment is encumbered.
When I come across this and set corners, I treat the easement like it is a right-of way taking (because it technically is similar) and set the corners at the end of the easement line but do note the land area to both the centerline and edge of the existing right-of -way.
Anybody trying to construct anything inthe roadway easement is going to be challenged and lose.
A problem I have encountered, rarely, is a situation where you cannot tell from the wording of basically the first deed that used distances as to where they began their measurement.?ÿ In one case, a stretch of roadway has no record of having ever been opened as a county road although it quite obviously existed.?ÿ If you don't know the year it was created, you don't know the default width to be used in that year.?ÿ The default width, set by state statute, for minimum width changed quite a bit over time.?ÿ Thus there is no definite edge of right-of-way other than the apparent use.?ÿ In this particular case, that stretch of road was turned over to the state in about 1930 for use as a state highway.?ÿ The DOT has no record that a specific width was ever determined.?ÿ A few years ago the state gave this stretch of paved road back to the county.
The first deed for a certain tract abutting has wording that blurs the intent.?ÿ A second deed that adds additional land to the first deed, says "going north from the state highway, 436 feet.?ÿ This would appear to assume the state held fee title to the strip of right-of-way, which they did not.?ÿ As no one knows where the edge of right-of-way is, legally speaking, it is impossible that they measured from that magic point.?ÿ Measuring 436 from the section line falls beyond the line of occupation.?ÿ Adding a theoretical right-of-way of 30 feet into that section reaches that additional 30 feet beyond the answer that is already not in agreement with any visible occupation.?ÿ It was a public school and nobody seemed to care precisely where the edge of the donated tract was supposed to be.
In this case the "magic point" according to the previous owner's original family from the 1930s is a steel rod placed at the then center line of the road (as the POB based on a point of initiation almost a thousand feet away at the larger tract's furthermost corner) which was an unpaid easement through the larger farm (PA Road Act). There was a lot created for a related family member at that time as the first subdivision in the 1930s.. A later newer house was added next door by the owner of/on the larger senior tract. No deed needed. It abutted next to the first. There was no subdivision or deed as it was part of the larger senior tract. After the death of the relative of the newer house in the 1980s another lot with that second house was created and put up for sale. That second later deed notes a ROW edge referring to two different dimensions from centerline in the same deed. The intent seems that it was aligned with the first tract from the 1930s (PA is the location) using that same "magic point". However.... A surveyor was brought in and the deed "metes and bounds" changed. It moves the "magic point" which was in the middle of the shared driveway in the centerline of the road between the two lots so that one lot has sixteen feet added to it and the totality of the driveway between the two lots with an easement agreement for the access of the 1930s lot to allow use of the driveway. So the edge of then current 50' ROW was then drawn on the "property plan" as the POB corner. The new "magic point" looks like it is magically the edge of the ROW and the 25 foot difference added to the back end of the lot (taking away from the senior property). Q: Should these lots back lines be moved 25 feet forward to the centerline of the road easement? Who owns the 25 foot strip for both lots? In addition the changing of the lines and bearings together with a missing leg of 16' and closure error of exactly 16' puts that line through the middle of a building. The "pin cushion" corner creating, low priced "deed stake out" surveyor kept all "problems" to a minimum and perpetuated the perhaps common myth in many areas that if a licensed surveyor is paid to do a deed stakeout based on the dimensions of the deed, that is what the actual reflection of what the deed holder owns based on his "opinion" (all other issues ignored apparently?). Just making a point about how important and necessary a full "retracement survey" is what should be the standard or at least to inform clients that they are only getting an opinion on a deed stakeout project (that could create pin cushion corners, lines through buildings, etc. as only fair to everyone affected!).
