Property Survey Legal Question

I had a company perform a survey on our house/property. They marked the 4 sides and their property lines. They marked the 4 fences, and their relationship to the property lines (how far off they are etc.)

When they measured the back property line of the house, they indicated that the fence was right on top of the property line - and it was straight. I built a shed (10x15) and measured off 6ft off of this fence for squareness (because the survey said it was perfect).

After almost finishing the shed, i started looking at the fence as I will be replacing it - and noticed it's actually far off from being on the property line - and is crooked. When I put the new fence in, it's going to make the shed appear crooked, and will shorten the distance between the shed and the property fence by more than a foot on one side, taking it out of code (making it 4 .5 feet from the fence).

I built the shed based on their measurements - they said they will come out and resurvey... but shouldn't they be responsible for the shed being off/out of code?

Thanks for any insights, folks. oh - this is norfolk, va

Reply to
RedDwarf
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No.

Reply to
alarman

No kidding. You never measure from a fence- you drive a stake at the surveyed (and guaranteed) corner pins, and run a string between them.

-- aem sends...

Reply to
aemeijers

"RedDwarf" wrote

Cool. You just answered a question I was thinking about asking. How far leeway am I required to have between a shed and a fence. Same area as you. I was hoping to mount it with only enough to get a lawnmower around there but I guess has to be more eh? Am looking at the smaller 8x10 size but the taller ones with a sort of almost upstairs loft for added stowage.

Reply to
cshenk

It appears that the OP looked at the sketch provided by the surveyor and assumed the property lines and structures on the drawing were exactly as they exist on the property. As you say, the only thing guaranteed by the survey are the locations of the actual boundary pins. The drawing is always an approximation.

The encroachment of the shed will probably not be a problem, unless he has a neighbor who files a complaint. It will need to be disclosed to any potential buyers in the future though...

Reply to
Robert Neville

You need to check with your local building inspector. There is no single answer

- it depends on local law and any property specific covenants.

Reply to
Robert Neville

And just to ampliy - It's quite common for a fence to be built inside a property line. Sometimes it's due to an error in placement, sometimes it's to deliniate a specific area and sometimes it's so that the neighbor can't make any changes to that side of the fence (i.e. paint or stain).

Reply to
Robert Neville

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If you do contact the local officials, do it anonamously (sp?) so they don't know who is calling. Use an unlisted/untraceable phone number. That way if you get an answer you don't like, you are not allowing them to check up on you. But, of course, no matter what happens, you will have to disclose that information when you sell the house as undoubtedly it will show up when they do a survey as part of the title search/transfer process when you sell the house.

Reply to
hrhofmann

Incidental stuff like a notation of a fence are just there for reference . You use the property line when laying out buildings.

Reply to
George

I'm wondering how the fence could be 4.5 feet away from the property line and not be obvious that its not on the line after they placed stakes at the corners. But I agree with the others that it's unlikely you can recover from the surveyor, as I would think they are primarily responsible for getting the boundaries right and unless you specifically asked for the fence to be surveyed, you're probably out of luck. Any structure should be measured from those stakes, not other objects shown on a survey.

Reply to
trader4

Lots of good responses . . . I will just add that for legal questions, you can try misc.legal.moderated.

Reply to
Heathcliff

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