I got involved in a situation, where a DEVELOPER bought a total station, and would buy large parcels of land. Then, he'd SURVEY it. We called in the Arkansas State Land Surveyor, "Cotton" Eugene Green at that time).
We all 3 wound up at a coffee shop, me the surveyor, the developer, and Cotton. Basicly, after about 15 min. Cotton conceded that the developer had the constitutional RIGHT to survey their own land.
I was blown away. There were several points that I just could not believe.
Like:?ÿ
That anybody could write deeds, and that the tax office would/could tolerate it.
That maybe this was ok, as long as his deeds did not touch any other adjoining deed. And, if it were just a land owner doing this. But, this was a DEVELOPER. essentially, this gave a survey?ÿ "license" to the developer.
That the state surveyors office "had no objection".
I'm still a bit run over about it.?ÿ
It was on 70 west of Hot Springs AR
O well. I'm recently monkeying with a 1320' square estate. With gaps, overlaps, and such. I knew the old guy who did it. Surveying his own land for his kids.?ÿ And, possibly a 2 acre gap. It's a mess. But, it was his own land, in the common sense of the idea, not a developer.?ÿ
Anyhow, I would think that some body has a good solution to this.
Thanksgiving is not far off.?ÿ
And, it's raining.
Nate
?ÿ
Surveying his own land for his kids.?ÿ And, possibly a 2 acre gap. It's a mess.... Anyhow, I would think that some body has a good solution to this.
Did he monument it??ÿ
on this one, no. It's deeds only.
McGough family
?ÿ
Finishing one today where the family had an attorney draft two descriptions out of a large tract. The fun one was rewriting one with somewhat precise bearings and distances to replace "thence westerly, northwesterly, westerly, southwesterly and northwesterly along the center line of the slough". This "slough" has a channel less than three feet wide and less than a foot deep at all points within the area of the intended tract. The completely stupid part is that this is in the middle of a cattle pasture that will remain cattle pasture on both sides. A new fence WILL be built somewhere that will cut off from 1.25 to 2 acres of the less than 5 acre tract. This was a grandpa to grandson situation with no giant rush to file a deed. Also, this is a family I have worked for numerous times before. For some reason grandpa decided he wanted to record a deed immediately instead of doing it correctly. It will never happen, but I have suggested the grandson deed back to grandpa whatever ends up being between a soon-to-be-built fence and the "center" of the slough.
I have a client that's an elderly rancher, he used my survey and filed his own deeds from my descriptions. I asked where to send the information, which title company or attorney he wanted to use, he just chuckled and said that he does them himself and has for many years.
That explained the handwritten description I was working from for the parent tract.
I didn't think it would be a problem for people to write their own deeds as long as they stuck to aliquot descriptions.?ÿ But I suppose that is too logical.
What becomes fun later is when you are trying to locate one of the many aliquots written in this manner that "might" be 82.5 feet wide by 165 feet deep. Usually by the time you are called out to find the boundaries of one of these quite of few of the tiny aliquot owners have already been figuring out their own boundaries using yardsticks. "Guess wut, Mama, Dat peach tree you planted 15 years ago is on Buford's place, not yours."
What do you mean might be that dimension? Are you saying that's the plat dimension but people are selling aliquot pieces and assuming what the plat says is what's actually out there?
I assume he is saying that the W2SE4SW4NW4 got staked out with a string of other 5ac, 2.5ac plots of land written using aliquot descriptions and the farmers laid them out from something and fenced them in and now the surveyor is trying to make some sense out of the patchwork properties,,,,,,,,,,needless to say it's not going to look like the BLM manual says in Chapter 3.
That's exactly the problem. Making what's on the ground match what the deed says. Do you break the section down again Everytime someone wants to build a fence.
Constitutional? As in the US one? I have read it a few times, and I am pretty sure that there isn't a part that covers subdivision of land by private parties within a state. You sure it was a coffee shop and not the tavern?
Anyone can write a description, but only a surveyor can determine if it is valid (can be laid out on the ground)...at least that is my perception of the situation in the state of Washington.
That is why you need a Recording Act. Once a survey with monuments is performed and of public record, rarely do you need to break down the whole section again, and if you do it is for a check. Most people won't reinvent the boundary just because they can "measure better". The better surveyors won't reinvent the wheel (they will check it), and the lesser ones don't want to take the time to check or reinvent.
Mighty Moe nailed it. They start out assuming the quarter section is precisely 2640 by 2640 and square. Keep getting smaller and smaller aliquots until you have a size sort of like a typical town lot. That was 42 years earlier than when you received the call to find the boundary of one of them little critters. I promise you it will not be pretty. Especially when Mama's peach tree belongs to her least favorite neighbor.
Another jewel is what we call spaghetti farms.?ÿ They are so long and narrow the only thing you raise on them is spaghetti.?ÿ Something like 165' by 2640'.?ÿ That may calc out to be 10 acres, but it's not good for much.?ÿ That makes for a nice long aliquot description,though.?ÿ Some shorten it to something like the south one-half of the north?ÿ one-eighth?ÿ of the northwest quarter of Section 26.
