Surveyor woes- any advice???

[J_J]

i don't have any disputes, as of now......this is why i want them marked now.....most of the neighbors have been really good and i want to keep it that way once they pass away or sell is mainly why i want them marked clearly.......

just like now, there is a cherry tree that fell on to me....it's about 75' from one of my clearly marked corners. i'd like to drag it in and cut it up.....i have a friend with a sawmill and i'd like to have some mantels made to use in our house when we build.......

what is in question, is whether or not the root ball is on me or the adjoining property......i'm sure the fella won't mind me taking it because he can't even hardly access his back corner where it is.......however, i'd like to know for sure (just as an example) so i don't have to ask.......

each state is different, but in general.....say a tree falls from my property and lands on another....who's responsible......i would assume me......what if it lands on a neighbor's barbed wired fence.....i assume i would have to repair it...

I believe that if your tree fell on his property, his home owners should take care of it. If your tree fell on his fence, his home owners should take care of that also. If the branches from his tree is touching your roof, you have the right to trim it by staying on your property. You have to be careful about things, like what if the tree dies after you trim it. What about his tree roots growing through his fence and breaking up your cement pad. There again you can dig them up, but if it kills the tree, debatable.

Sometimes, one thinks he knows justice, but not.

 

[Egon]

(on the survey plat) says it runs 1400 feet, is that a straight line distance like the crow flies, or is that a wheel on the ground distance?

That is horizontal distance.

 

[kthompson]

I would visit the office. It might be anything. he may not even be in business any longer. He could be sick or even passed away with answering machine running. That is unless you know why he does not answer. Or you could drop him a letter in the mail asking did he know his answering machine is not keeping messages as you are sure he would return them.


This may vary from state to state but don't think you have the legal right to trim limbs or roots that cross your property line. Think it is the responsibility of the tree's owner. If they will not then believe you will find you need to go to court to require them to. If they have a good and growing tree and it falls say in a storm and does you damage think that is your loss. If it is dead and easy known then that is their responsibility for allowing a dangerous situation (not the word they use).

 

[tallyho8]

During Katrina 75 of my neighbors trees fell down on my property on top of my new 3000' long fence on the edge of my cleared pasture. Lawyers said "it's an act of God and the neighbor is not responsible to clean up the trees or repair your fence". It took me several months to cut up and burn his trees and repair my fence.

I hired a surveyor for $6000 to mark the 4 corners of the 6 acre lot I bought. He marked 3 corners and said the other corner was under water because it had rained so he didn't mark it. It took him about 3 hours of field work.

 

[Flatheadyoungin]

speaking of time to do the job......

one of the neighbors said that they showed up every day at about 8 and worked until about 4, for two weeks.....ticks, chiggers and poision ivy was/is VERY bad......they even made some jovial comments as to how "hard" it was to survey.....as i said before, all of the fence lines are completely grown up.....

but, he didn't act like any of that was a problem.....

 

[ZetorShaun]

I think that it is a problem to have all that overgrowth. I spent a lot of time hacking away with my surveyor to get very specific sightings from very specific locations, I wanted very accurate pins. I saved some money because he didn't have to have a crew there and they were doing another job making him money.
We did it in the Fall to avoid the overgrowth and we still chopped quite a bit.

How can he be accurate without good sightings from some central locations? They probably swag quite a bit when it is like that, and that gets you pins that are "close enough" but not accurate. They need to lay in pins with the expectation that they can defend them in court. This is serious business, if you are paying taxes on 60 acres you should know where all 60 acres are. I am not giving up an inch.

Sounds like tallyho paid a premium price but did not get good service. Underwater? He should have given you two pins on either side of the water. That guy stinks.

 

[EddieWalker]

One of my boundries is a creek. The pins are set inside my property line 25 feet from the center of the creek and marked as such on the survey. If they cannot get to a point, they don't have to. They do have to mark it as such and say where the pin is and where it is from the actualy boundry.

I found that I can save allot of money by clearing the land for them to work. They charge by the hour that they are in the field, so if they are done in half the time, it's a significant savings. Having the area cleared speeds things up for them. They can see farther, so they can set out their markers farther and move along faster.

If not, they have their ways, but it's more work for them, which means a bigger bill for you. Simple math.

Eddie

 

[Podunkadunk]

Thanks for the gospel Egon.

I have been doing what Eddie is talking about for the last 2 years. I've got one last run of my line to clear, then I'm calling a different survey team out, not to do another survey, but to ascertain whether the original team was on the mark or not. It'll be easy, straight line of site work for them, no hacking, no using a chainsaw or machette. I don't think one of the corners is marked correctly.

On another note, When I get them cleared, I'm going to use an oil based white paint and paint some 6' diameter circles around the corners. Then, next time the Google Earth Satellite comes over snapping pics, I'll be able to see them from above. I mean, I can see my fenceposts, I should be able to see a 6' circle in bright white!

Podunk

 

[Flatheadyoungin]

he didn't act like it being grown up was an issue at all....kind of dismissed it, really.......BUT maybe he mentioned the job to his boys and they kind of stalled it.....

it's a LOT clearer now than it was. they shot angles through the fields....some simple geometry should allow them to shoot through the fields and then place something on the line.....

i would bush hog more, in certain areas, but i don't want to get on to someone else....i told him he could put paint down in the general vacinity and i'd come along and back the bush hog in there and clear a wide path for them...

i think i'll leave a message something about it's not nearly as grown up as it was, if that is stalling him at all.......and that i'll sit quietly on my tractor seat waiting for them to tell me where to plunge cut for them

 

[J_J]

With an accuracy of 5 mm, why are there not more surveyors using GPS. I also believe that GPS data will stand up in court, especially if you could tell the judge the exact coordinates he is sitting at that moment. I know price is a big factor, but for the accuracy, I would think it would be worth it, and the labor saved, plus the ability to get the job done faster . I guess you all know that the government can flip a switch and kill the accuracy of GPS. Are there any qualifications one should look for when searching for a surveyor. Are they registered, or certified. Is there any way to check to see if any of their surveys have been in dispute.

Purdue University CORS