The most important thing you can know about your farm - the boundaries!

[seedcorn]

IF carport on your property, the tree took out YOUR carport. In Illinois, they would have never been able to sell the property without your sig. Person built his brand new house, didn't do survey, had to buy 6' of neighbor's land. I would have made him buy whole property as you will never recoup loss of yard. Until bought, he couldn't do anything to house as it technically belonged to his neighbor as well. Bank who gave construction loan, was in real bad way.

 

[Ridgerunner]

You'd think surveying would be an exact science, but not the way it is practiced around here. I recently bought 0.95 acres from a neighbor. Had to have it surveyed. Can't close a sale here without a valid survey. I checked with three different survey companies. Each one was a flat $800 for a survey no matter what.

The pins were in place from the last survey which showed the property was 2.0 acres. Nope, a different survey company did the work so it was actually 2.05 acres. Out 0.95 became 0.98 acres. Of course, now they use satellite positioning and all this new technology that is so much better instead of using theodolites and measuring from established benchmarks like we did when I was on a survey crew in 1970. It's labor-saving and all that but it's not necessarily more accurate.

Anyway, when the property was surveyed off and the pins were in place and located I dug out around them and poured a bag of concrete around them. I got some color pigment from Lowe's to mix in with that concrete so it could easily be seen. Now I can easily find the four corners of my property. That red shows up pretty well.

The fences are certainly not on the property line. On all sides except the road, the fences ore offset about a foot. All the fences are actually on my property so I own them. Maintenance is my responsibility though the neighbor that runs cattle fixes problems when he sees them and he regularly patrols his fences. He also takes care of brush growing up in the fencerows. He's a good neighbor. I'm blessed in that.

 

[Smart Red]

@Gaz, I am in just that situation now. When we purchased this property we had it surveyed first. There were flags and pink paint everywhere. This had been a 60 acre farm that was divided into 30 acres (more or less) and the boundary lines went beside several farm buildings and right through one.

The neighbor with the house and barn showed us where the pipes were buried, front and back. It looked to me like the road spike marker was further into what he considered his land than the pipe, but DH said to forget it and take the pipes as property land. Who wants to move into a property and start a range war right away? Not us.

In 1997 we had the line between us re-marked (surveyed) from pipe to pipe as we begin clearing out that area. The neighbor had no problem with the markings. Then two years later he sold his property. We wondered why they didn't get it surveyed first, but it wasn't our problem.

When we reached the property line on that side with our cleaning and clearing, the woman came over in the dark of night and tore out a stake we'd put on top of the surveyor's stake to strike a straight line. That's when we realized she didn't know where the property lines were.

Being a teacher, I figured she just needed some visuals and explanation so I ran off copies of all our records and maps. I took the over to her one day. She yelled that she wanted her privacy and we were cutting down her property!

She insisted -- her friends had said -- we couldn't be closer to her shed than 8 feet because that was the law. I told her that we had once shared a shed with the neighbors because the line went through it until we tore it down together.

She insisted that the small fenced in area I had once put up around our (now gone) shed for winter pasture/shelter for my horses had to be the property "fence" line. Why? Because that's what she had thought (or wanted to think) -- even though the fenced area was small and rectangular.

So here we are 16 years after these new neighbors moved in and we are answering attorney letters regarding the property lines that are asking us to quit-claim 15 feet over to them. That is 15 feet -- 0.5 an acre -- from front to back even though, to my knowledge, no one ever questioned the pipe at the rear of the property as being moved or wrong.

I wrote back to their attorney citing the State's Adverse Possession laws as simply as I could, explaining 37 years ago that a. we were told this was our property line by the prior owner, b. we paid taxes for this property, and c. we had used this property as we wished for all those years. That should have covered even a mistake in the survey done for us before getting the property which is unlikely since the same surveyor did both parcels.

It has been over two months with no response, but I'm still not sleeping well over this problem. It is a whole other story I could tell about being neighbors, but that isn't pertinent to the boundary situation. If I had not kept all those records -- along with my fantastic memory -- who knows what might have happened. DH doesn't remember anything related to our early days here on our new property.

 

[seedcorn]

Red, I'm lost. If surveyed, why didn't everyone go by surveyed maps? Don't get where there could be any argument that leads to lawyers.

How do you buy property where you share a building? Who pays taxes, insurance, etc?

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

i am grateful that we have a farmer's wall that borders our backyard. no one can contest that without doing a lot of heavy lifting. they aren't even legal to move, add or remove stones without getting city permission to do any repair work to them.

only 1 neighbor beside us had their driveway put in many years ago before we inherited the property but while my FIL still owned the land. the driveway is about 1/2 way on our land but we get along so far with the neighbor and his elderly mother (the father was the one who put the driveway in while he was alive). i do dread the day they would try and sell the house or if he gave it to his daughter.

 

[Smart Red]

For some reason, the surveyor (long passed) didn't file the survey documents with the county records department. That was something we'd never considered a possibility. We did give them copies of our surveys, but they still thought there was a problem.

I really suspect there is very little difference between what they think is theirs and what I think is ours. If we could get together in a discussion I think the problem would have been settled. For some reason the wife has taken a great dislike to us that includes forbidding her husband from interacting with us as well. He seemed much friendlier at times.

The 60 acres was divided into two 30 acre parts. The first buyer (our neighbor) didn't want/couldn't afford more than 30 acres. The established buildings and house laid close to the middle of the 60 acres at the time. To make each 30 acres, the boundary line went just west of the first building, through the next, east of our shed, and nearly grazed the west side of the grain building. We had the whole corn crib and the neighbors had the barn. I doubt that would be allowed today, but 40 years ago it passed Township zoning.

The neighbor had the old farmhouse on his side and we built a house on our 30 acres. The shed/building wasn't a problem at the time. We knew and worked well with the first neighbors. Taxes were paid on each of the 30 acre parcels. We had the house insured and that covered any buildings on the property, but I honestly never gave the shared building a thought where insurance or liability were concerned. The building itself wasn't worth much.

The neighbor had his electricity running to the shed, but we owned 3/4 of the building. We raised a couple of calves together and I had a few chickens for a while before we agreed to tear it down. That was with our first neighbors. We got along well with them. Three of the four old sheds were torn down long before the new people bought the property so the easiest way of showing where the line was drawn was no longer possible.

 

[Smart Red]

only 1 neighbor beside us had their driveway put in many years ago before we inherited the property but while my FIL still owned the land. the driveway is about 1/2 way on our land but we get along so far with the neighbor and his elderly mother (the father was the one who put the driveway in while he was alive). i do dread the day they would try and sell the house or if he gave it to his daughter.

That is where your state laws on Adverse Possession come into play. They may get the driveway after using it for so long unless there is something written between "the father" and your FIL.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

i'm sure my FIL did not agree to anything with the neighbor. my FIL was a grouch and especially didn't like them trying to clear fallen trees from their own property after a storm, the trees that fell were from my FIL's property. good thing the trees didn't destroy anything of value or their house!

i know when we went about 7 years ago to buy property we had a title search done and part of what they do is check to be sure there is no illegally built structures/fences/road/easements/right of ways that didn't have city permits in place or previously written into the sale of the property. if it wasn't disclosed at the time of sale they are considered illegally placed and need to be removed. deeds will state where the edge of the property should start and end but they state usually so many feet from a certain landmark or a specifically named property. i thought i was told a few years ago the city was going to have the property lines surveyed in certain parts of town but i have yet to see it happen or hear any updates.

 

[catjac1975]

My daughter look at a house where half of a garage was on the neighbors property. I don't know if they were once joined, an error made in old days, or a generosity from one neighbor to another. The house did sell.

 

[seedcorn]

The driveway could be "right of way" which is right of both parties to use