Finding property lines

[bones1]

What would a surveyor use to find my property lines?.
Is this something I can do myself.There are no property markers that I can find.Has anyone been successful doing this themselves?

 

[scott_vt]

What would a surveyor use to find my property lines?.
Is this something I can do myself.There are no property markers that I can find.Has anyone been successful doing this themselves?

Hi Bones,
Even if you did find some markers, stonewalls, steel pins etc you would still need a surveyor to accurately mark out the remainder of the property. If by chance you could find a marker or two that would give you a start, providing you have a copy of the property map from town records, to find the rest of the boundaries. If you cant find anything at all I would think you would need a surveyor, and you may as well have him use steel pins to define your property. Best to find one and get a price quote IMHO.

 

[Paddy]

This is a prety open question without some basic land description and what your tring to do.

In the country your pins can be in the middle of the street. Some go a head and set pins just off the road. I use a metal detector to find the pins streetside. Then look at your legal description. Simple geometry like 92 deg east for 238 ft. I have used a compus to get me in a general direction. Then I pull out the metal detector again. I found all my pins this way and my land is heavy foest 660' x 1500'. to find points in between is bit more fun. At night have two friends help. They will need cell phones and flash lights. You stand at one known pin, say street side. Friend 1# stand back at the corner pin on the same line. Second friend locates approx half way between the pins. Friend 1# and 2#turns on their lights. call the middle friend , 2# to instruct him to move left or right. When the lights are lined up, you have found a point on the line. Good enough for general use.

 

[MikePA]

I used to work for a civil engineer. One of the services he offered was property surveys, which is what I got involved in, from the field work to the plans. Here are the steps.

1. Get current deed of your property.
2. Get older deeds of your property, if available.
3. Do the same for all deeds that adjoin your property.
4. Make sure your deed 'closes'
5. Compare all the deeds to make sure the directions and distances match.
6. If they don't, figure out why and try to determine which directions and distances are correct.
7. Perform field work to find existing markers and place new ones.

Typically, deeds begin with a phrase "Starting at a point...." We'd try and find this point first. Sometimes it's measuring from landmarks, other property lines, etc. These days it might mean using a GPS to find the point. If the starting point can not be found, we have to measure from a known point then traverse to get to the property being surveyed. Also, if one of your property line(s) is a road, the line probably runs down the center of the road. (This is true in PA, perhaps not where you live).

Can you do this yourself? Yep. All the documents I mentioned above are available at the county courthouse at the Recorder of Deeds office.

You didn't state why you want to do this, which would be helpful in answering if it's wise to do this yourself.

 

[Egon]

In Canada you would require a survey licence for any work of legal status.

Egon

 

[bones1]

I used to work for a civil engineer. One of the services he offered was property surveys, which is what I got involved in, from the field work to the plans. Here are the steps.

1. Get current deed of your property.
2. Get older deeds of your property, if available.
3. Do the same for all deeds that adjoin your property.
4. Make sure your deed description 'closes'
5. Compare all the deeds to make sure the directions and distances match.
6. If they don't, figure out why and try to determine which directions and distances are correct.
7. Perform field work to find existing markers and place new ones.

Typically, deeds begin with a phrase "Starting at a point...." We'd try and find this point first. Sometimes it's measuring from landmarks, other property lines, etc. These days it might mean using a GPS to find the point. If the starting point can not be found, we have to measure from a known point then traverse to get to the property being surveyed. Also, if one of your property line(s) is a road, the line probably runs down the center of the road. (This is true in PA, perhaps not where you live).

Can you do this yourself? Yep. All the documents I mentioned above are available at the county courthouse at the Recorder of Deeds office.

You didn't state why you want to do this, which would be helpful in answering if it's wise to do this yourself.

So I can get a copy of my neighbors deed?What do you mean by "Make sure your deed 'closes'
Just want to know where the property lines are.I think I have someones shed on my property.He was here first so maybe he's right.

 

[bones1]

Can you do this with a gps unit?

 

[MikePA]

So I can get a copy of my neighbors deed?What do you mean by "Make sure your deed 'closes'
Just want to know where the property lines are.I think I have someones shed on my property.He was here first so maybe he's right.

Here in PA, anyone can get a copy of a deed. All you need to know are the names of the owners. Look them up in a deed book and ask for a copy.

Making sure the description closes means that if you follow every direction and distance mentioned in the deed, you should end up exactly where you started. How good a deed description closes is determined by how much of a gap there is between where you started and where you finish. There are shareware, at least there used to be, products that all you enter are the direction and distances and it will show you a plot of the parcel, including how well it closes.

If there's a possibility of this ending up in someone moving a shed, I strongly suggest getting a licensed surveyor involved. Just because he was there first, doesn't mean he is right. It was not unusual for us to survey a parcel and determine that the lines everyone thought we correct were not, particularly if they were using landmarks like old stone walls, fences, creeks, etc.

A GPS unit can get you close, but if the shed is somewhere close to the line, I don't think GPSs are accurate enough. Maybe I am wrong, we never used them.

 

[EddieWalker]

Why are you trying to find your boundries?

If it's just curiosity or maybe putting up a fence, then you need to find the starting point. Either a survey or legal discription of the land will be needed. Surveys of the land may be tricky to get unless you know who did the last survey and they are willing to give or sell you a copy. Legal discriptions are public record and just cost a few bucks to have copies made. This is what I did.

Read the discription and determine where the beginning is and how to find it. You'll need a good way to measure distance and direction.

Even surveyors with training and the right gear will dig around in the dirt looking for pins. They know it's there, but I've seen holes a few feet away from the pin as they looked for it.

Most pins are pieces of half inch rebar, but he legal discription will say what it is. Sometimes it could be a piece of pipe, cement block, a tree, the middle of a creek or some other natural or man made landmark.

If you need to know where the boundries are for anything legal, then you have to hire it done. No way to do it yourself without a stamp to certify it as being true and a bond to insure it's accuracy.

Also remember that neighbors will sometime remove or move the pins to their advantage. Sometimes it's just a few feet, sometimes it's gone. Then they will pretend ignorance and get angry when you put it back. There are all sorts of threads of people here who have cemented in their survey markers to keep them from being removed.

Good luck
Eddie

 

[Paddy]

'Make sure your description closes' is the likely intended wording. It means you will return to the starting point.

For your needs, you want to see if there is an encrouchment. before to pay to see your wrong...or right, spend a few hours yourself. Check your own closing paper work. if the barn/building was there and encroching before you bought, it should show on your "morgage survey". Find your pins. I have 6 pc of land and I have never had a survey. I have located my pins and they match my descriptions....close enough. Then do the flash light trick. If you are sure there is a problem, you will need to make a dession, what do you want?. In my area they rearly have the structure torn down.

 

[bones1]

Thanks for the replies. Would a marker or pin be in the middle of the street in front of the property in the asphalt?
Didn't look there,but I will tonight.
Thanks all.

PS Neighbors shed was put up 2 weeks after I moved in.Interesting huh.Marking his ground like a puppy?.

 

[MikePA]

It depends what kind of shed it is. A box store, garden utensil type it gets moved. A tractor shed and it probably doesn't.

 

[MikePA]

Thanks for the replies. Would a marker or pin be in the middle of the street in front of the property in the asphalt?
Didn't look there,but I will tonight.
Thanks all.

PS Neighbors shed was put up 2 weeks after I moved in.Interesting huh.Marking his ground like a puppy?.

Our standard practice was to put a large head nail, with bright ribbon under the head, in the middle of the road as well as offset stakes at the edge of the road right of way.

 

[rozett]

What would a surveyor use to find my property lines?.
Is this something I can do myself.There are no property markers that I can find.Has anyone been successful doing this themselves?

In certain parts of the country, this can be a very difficult proposition. Our property was in the same family for 200 years. The deed was a typical "old New England" deed.... 'starting at soandso's property, got north 500 feet to someone else's property, turn 90 degrees and run xxx feet to another property'..... This was the type of deed that existed for our property. Our licensed surveyor researched 200 years worth of deeds for our property and for each abutting property. He also had to research at least one superior court case dealing with property lines after the town moved the road. At that point, his field work began. He had to 'rough out' the boundaries, based on the research, and looked for stone walls, wire fences, iron rods, etc. Armed with all of that info, he surveyed up the road from the nearest benchmark to locate the two front corners. Then he recorded GPS data for the balance of the boundaries.

After going through all of that, it's easy to understand why two different surveyors might come out with different results. In our case, we had him write a new deed and file that and a Boundary Survey Map with the county registrar of deeds. All of the deeds are public records, so you or your surveyor could go a pull copies for your property and your neighbors. If it has been surveyed in the last 30 years or so, you should be able to locate a reference benchmark that will be helpful in locating the first corner.

 

[MikePA]

After going through all of that, it's easy to understand why two different surveyors might come out with different results.

It's also why we couldn't quote a flat fee for a survey.

 

[Paddy]

You can dig and look all day and never find the pins. Use a metal detctor. If you can determine a general location, 20x20', you'll find it.

 

[dmccarty]

Bones1,

GPSes usually are not accurate to find property lines if you are tryng to get spot on the line or the corner. Its can get you in the area to find a pin but that is about it. If you have tree cover then the errors get larger.

The Register of Deeds might have a survey on file for your property. If you live in a subdivision I would be shocked if a survey is not in the Deeds office. If no survey then you have to go by what the Deed says about the lines. This can get you in the general area but its not going to be good enough to put up a fence or something permanent.

How much land are you talking about?
Is it wooded?
Mature woods or a cutover that is filling in?

I have been clearing my lines on the east and west side of our land. On those sides I have pins about every 300 feet. However its very brushy and the pins are very hard to find even though I know about where they should be. Since the neighbor's have timbered it makes it somewhat easy to know the general location of the line but since the sun gets in there is an explosion of brush that makes finding the pins very difficult. I got lucky on one line and a survery was done over there this winter and I have been following his tape. I'll keep those lines open from now on and mark them with painted trees and Tposts near the pins.

I have three other lines, two about 800 feet long and one about 1200 that I will have to have a surveyor mark. We know where the pins are located but getting a line accurate enough to put up a fence is not possible with us running GPS or a compass. The surveyor will have to do it We have tried but can't get the line to meet in the middle.

Later,
Dan

 

[RonMar]

The GPS's used in survey work are far different than the ones you might buy at your local sporting goods dealer. The major difference is in the antenna used which will determine the number of sattelites tracked simultaneously. This is particularly important if you are working back in under the trees. The small Garmins and Magellans you can buy are good, but they sacrifice antenna signal to noise ratio to get that tiny antenna that will fit into a handheld unit. They might say they are a 12 channel receiver, but how often do you see them tracking that many birds simultaneously, even out in the open? The birds are up there, if you have the antenna to see them. The more satellites you can track at the same time, the quicker your position will settle. They also culumatively average the position data so the longer you stay in a position, the more refined it becomes. You can do this with your handheld GPS, but you will have to output the position data to a computer to average it over time. You have probably seen survey crews using GPS, it will either look like a stick with a white dome antenna on the top about 6" in diameter or the antenna will be on a tripod over a survey mark. I worked with a guy last fall from the USGS getting him to remote sites to set up a receiver to take long term averages over USGS markers. The antenna was about 14" across and cost several thousand dollars.

I am working on a similar survey problem to lay out lines for fences. I have 3 good corner markers but so far have not found the 4th. It should be easy as it is one along the road and the corner marks are based on the road center line. My northern property line is also a quarter section line. Since the corner in question is along this line, the fences across the road give me a good idea of where to look but I havn't found it yet. I need to try the metal detector though, that is a good idea. The other three corners are marked with a piece of 1" steel pipe with an ID tag and the reference numbers that are stated on my deed. I also can't see from corner to corner so have been working on a method using a laser plumbbob to give me someting to sight on. I just need a night with enough moisture in the air to allow me to see the laser beam pointing straight up into the sky.

 

[MikePA]

When we couldn't see from corner to corner, we'd swing the transit 30 degrees off the line, mark a spot out as far as we could see, set the transit on this new spot, site back to the starting point, swing the transit 120 degrees and site the other corner. Sometimes we'd have to do this numerous times depending on how many obstructions there were.

Regarding the laser plumb bob, smoke would work as well to see the beam.

 

[bones1]

I guess it's time for a metal detector.
Any good brands recommended?.

Another question.Let's just say I went to the local fence company and bought a fence,say for the whole property,would they just come out,ask where the boundarys are and install or would they order a survey?.Do most people get a survey before a fence?