Private property owners often need to have land surveyed to protect their investments. Land surveys, often also called lot surveys or property surveys, are done by qualified professional surveyors.
What is a property survey?
Land surveys are done to answer questions about the characteristics of parcels of land, and to record those answers in a legal document. Property expert Sandra Rinomato provides the following basic definition of this type of survey: “A property survey shows the boundaries of the property indicating the lot size, and includes a written description of the property.”
Different kinds of land surveys
Residential property owners don’t always require the same thing from a survey, so the requirements should be clearly defined in each situation. Fred Hutchinson’s article “Land Surveying in Nova Scotia,” published on the website of the Association of Nova Scotia Land Surveyors suggests helpful questions for preparing to talk to a surveyor. Do you need:
- the boundaries determined and survey markers placed at the corners of the lot?
- previously established boundaries confirmed and lost survey markers replaced?
- a certified plan of the survey?
- a description of buildings, structures, or features currently present on the land? Building permits and mortgages may require this type of survey, which produces a location certificate.
- to change boundary lines for subdivision of a piece of land?
When is a land survey required?
You may need to get a survey done if:
- you need to know where property lines lie and no legal documents exist that accurately define boundaries
- you plan to build on vacant land
- you intend to sell (or possibly buy) a piece of land
- you intend to subdivide a piece of land
- you intend to build an addition or install a swimming pool or other structure on the property
- there is evidence that another party is encroaching on the property
A property owner (or potential buyer) may understandably feel the temptation to skip the survey, given that it can cost several thousand dollars, depending on the circumstances and the amount of work required. The corners of a property may be marked: a piece of rebar sticking out of the ground on one corner, a rock at another, a strip of orange plastic tied to a tree at a third, but that is not good enough. Trees fall, rocks heave, children go off with pieces of rebar. To firmly establish the boundaries of a property, get a survey done by a qualified professional.
Is an old land survey valid?
Even if an old survey exists, it’s best that a new survey be done and it's sometimes legally required. This is because things unavoidably change over the course of time: people alter buildings, landscape, and build fences and outbuildings, changing the important features of the property; natural forces can change the landscape; old surveys may contain inaccuracies due to mistakes.
In his article “The Deed Description,” Fred Hutchinson points out that one can only be comfortable that property boundaries and important features of the property, have been accurately determined when the survey, the deed description, and the physical reality all agree. The advent of GPS technology is likely to make land surveys much more accurate and may reduce the need for repeated surveys in the future, but the rising cost of the technology needed to do the job will also likely make them more expensive.
Rosemary Drisdelle - Rosemary Drisdelle has been published many times as a nonfiction writer and several times as a poet. Her first book, Parasites: Tales of ...
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