Surveying a rural homestead

Ever tried to have a rural piece of land surveyed... especially one that hasn't been surveyed in nearly 100 years?

I mentioned in a previous post that I had my new 1.82 acres of land surveyed. It should have been a simple process of figuring out the boundaries for the four sides of my land, right?

Wrong. Three sides ended up being relatively easy for the surveyor to figure out. But the back side had issues. The back side of my lot butts up against acres and acres of woods. The question was, how far into those woods does my property line go? The answer, even after the land was officially surveyed, is.... who knows?

Here's the deal:

I got 1.82 acres of a plot of about 30 acres that belonged to Nancy. It has been in Nancy's family for years. The piece I got is an odd piece that sort of juts out from the rest of her land. See the cleared piece to the right on the Google Earth image above?

The last survey for her land was done in the 1920's. Most of the markers were "big rocks" according to the survey. Well, in almost 100 years, those big rocks have moved. They are no longer there. And the original road is no longer there, so the surveyor couldn't just measure from the road to see how far back the land goes.

He checked the next door neighbor's survey, but guess what? She must have had the same problem because only three sides of her land were surveyed... not the back of it.

The woods behind my lot belong to a woman who currently resides in a nursing home. Her land has never been surveyed. The only way to truly find the back of the property line, according to the surveyor, is to go acres and acres into the woods until it butts up against someone else's property and measure backwards. And instead of $400, I would have had to pay the man several thousand dollars.

The solution? The surveyor found what he thought was a good estimate of the back of my land (about ten feet into the woods or so). He made my official line on the edge of the woods. The 10 feet (give or take) into the woods will still officially belong to Nancy.

One day, when the woman in the nursing home passes away, one of two things will happen. Either her land will stay in her family, in which case it will probably remain wooded and probably still won't be surveyed; or it will be bought by someone else who will have to have it surveyed and then I will know exactly where my line is.

In the meantime, Nancy will still officially own a tiny strip (about 10 feet wide) in the back of my land. If it ever gets surveyed she'll deed that tiny strip over to me.

WHAT YOU CAN LEARN FROM THIS: Before you buy land in a rural area, make sure you will be able to have it surveyed (without paying an arm and a leg). Make sure all four sides have been surveyed in the past by surrounding land owners if your particular piece has never been surveyed before.