Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor

   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #11  
OK, I give up. Whats a piker?
It is an old descriptive term that seems to be only used in the Northeast US.
I'll let Hay Dude explain.
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #12  
I have a neighbor - lives a little over five miles away. His property abuts mine on the north. He, at times, can be a PITA. Like me, he is old, but he has a son to maintain his lands.

His son is a really fine fellow. I get along with the son very well.
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #13  
OK, I give up. Whats a piker?

piker​

[ pahy-ker ]SHOW IPA

See synonyms for piker on Thesaurus.com

noun Informal.
a person who does anything in a contemptibly small or cheap way.
a stingy, tight-fisted person; tightwad.
a person who gambles, speculates, etc., in a small, cautious way.


The way we use it is in describing a guy who thinks he’s a “player”.
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #14  
I am a mostly retired land surveyor and like the OP’s post. I like where he describes reading deeds and the time it takes. I also have spent time reading deeds that have problems. Typos are not that uncommon when property is transferred and reading old deeds can clarify the typo.

An important point to understand is there is not always a “correct” answer. Say you could get 10 surveyors to survey something that has one missing corner. If it’s very simple they would all put the corner in the same place. If it’s very complicated there might be a large circle that would be made by all the pins they set.
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #15  
I have a neighbor - lives a little over five miles away. His property abuts mine on the north. He, at times, can be a PITA. Like me, he is old, but he has a son to maintain his lands.

His son is a really fine fellow. I get along with the son very well.
Us older folks can ALL be a PITA to others at times!
We tend to not tolerate tomfoolery.
 
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   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #16  
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #17  
Everybody can tell you where your lines are; your neighbor, the previous owner, the realtor; yet if you aren't proficient at reading deeds, a good surveyor is the best person to talk to.
I can only imagine the joy in surveying property lines in parcels the size of the ones you deal with, especially here in New England where distances are listed in rods, and corners indicated by "the old oak tree", lot size in acres "more or less", etc.
My wonderful “I have arrived” neighbor who moved next door about 5 years ago keeps conveniently cleaving off my property and landscaping it to his hearts delight. My favorite touches of theirs is the old “plant bushes with mulch beds in my lawn” technique, followed closely by the “plant bamboo 10’ from my driveway and let it bend over onto my cars when it snows” technique.
Man I need a surveyor
Yeah, something you ought to deal with sooner than later before this neighbor tries to claim the property thru adverse possession/squatter's rights. If nothing else, the longer you let things go the deeper precedent you set.
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #18  
If nothing else, the longer you let things go the deeper precedent you set.
Yeah. Thinking that way - that's why I immediately went over and painted a 16" high white band all the way around the tree at the surveyor's corner stake after I learned the kid over there had moved my witness monument. (Post #9, above).

Now the corner was unmistakably visible from their side, as well as mine.
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor
  • Thread Starter
#19  
Here's an old thread nearly identical to this one. My post shows a newspaper delivery tube that I nailed to a tree across the ravine. It's a 'witness monument' above a corner stake that had just been placed by a pro surveyor. I intended it to be visible from our side so I could point it out to my family.

Grandma of that clan had just had a survey done as part of her estate planning, to clarify her intended inheritances of various parcels over there.

What I didn't post in that old thread was that a week after I climbed through the poison oak jungle in the ravine to nail that newspaper tube to the tree, I met the Black Sheep grandson of the clan over there. He insisted the property line was the stream in the bottom of the ravine and the far slope was his to run his 4-wheeler on. He insisted that my newspaper tube monument was down at the creek so the far slope was his. I discovered he had moved my monument within a week after I placed it.

I phoned the surveyor for verification then went and painted a 16 inch tall white band around the tree over there where my newspaper tube had been. After I described the grandson's dishonest act, and argument, to another neighbor, word got back to Grandma and he quit riding his 4-wheeler in my ravine. Several years later he was found dead in bed and everyone said they were sure that was from his drug habit. Everyone remaining in that clan is good decent folks, good neighbors.


And a little farther down in that thread. A story I wrote about someone who sued the state over a property line issue and I was sent to hear his argument. The conclusion I wrote up was he had no loss, therefore his claim was pointless. I don't think he prevailed.

Actually that entire thread is interesting, for anyone interested in property surveys.
To paraphrase Charles Holland Duell; "This just goes to show that everything that can be posted already has been posted." :D
 
   / Sometimes it's worth it to hire a land surveyor #20  
I am very nervous of my situation. distances weren’t adding up after buying my lot two miles down a dirt road. The surveyors came and the corner on the intersection is actually in the center of the roadway. It is a dirt road. The lot was treed and during the course of the last 5 years I cleared the lot enough to install the driveway, build a house/garage. I piled my wood down there, trailer, tractor etc as often I could not turn or needed space for cement-trucks further up the driveway etc. I had to put a pickup load of wood down on the corner, which was on the edge of the road way but maybe 6-8 feet from one side of my boundary and maybe 25 feet inside my other boundary being on a corner. They sent me an email last summer and said someone was having issues with wood but at a different lot number. a Lot that doesn’t exist in there. My thoughts were, well you should find out what lot their really talking about and if it is mine I can accommodate . But I didn’t. I just said any wood I had was inside my boundary’s and that I wasn’t planning to leave it there over the winter. This was in the summer. The next morning I go out there and they bull dozed it into the ditch. I was planning to put a street lamp at least out A little further to prevent more migration of the turn. However yesterday they spread recycled asphalt around the turn It use to be a logging road turned cottAge area. The logging company had a “right of way” designated for a the Road and is exceptionally wide. I’m thinking 60 feet or more. Yet the road which is approx 30 feet wide leaves the right of way and crosses my corner. My survey clearly shows the narrow road, leave the wide right of way on paper. I also showed this to the husband of the recently elected president of the road association last year. He assumed it was half the road on my lot, half the road on the other lot across from me. But I showed him that no, it’s a right of way that separates me from the guy across the lot and at that corner it’s exceptionally wide. Despite the road only being 30 feet or so.
 

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