Today in the office I was talking with another agent. She was telling me about a problem that had arisen with one of her listings.
She had listed a country home with acreage a little while back. She went to the courthouse and pulled the data card which showed that the property had eight acres. The owners confirmed that information. The lady that owned it said that her father had purchased the property over fifty years ago.
Now I wasn't even around fifty years ago so I don't really know much as to how business was done then. But I will guess that when he purchased the property he probably didn't get a survey done. I can envision in my head two guys smoking a cigar finishing the deal with a handshake. I do know that handshakes meant a lot more then than they do know, but that's another subject for another time.
Well, the agent that listed the property talked the owners into having a survey done. She wasn't really worried. She wanted to use it to for buyers showing them exactly where the property lines were as well as exact acreage. Plus if they went ahead and did it now, it reduced the chance a buyer would want to do one. She had no idea what the report was about to show them.
It turns out the owners didn't have eight acres. As matter of fact, they didn't have seven or even six. The report came back and showed that the sellers only owned five acres! They only owned a little over half the amount of acreage they thought they did. What's even worse is they have been paying taxes on eight acres for over fifty years!
This is a great example of why surveys are so important. I would really encourage everyone to have a survey done for property you are purchasing or have purchased recently, especially those with acreage. You wouldn't buy a car only to find out later that the tires don't come with it. This is the same in that you wouldn't buy property only to find out later that land you thought came with it, didn't.
This is also an example of not being able to trust everything the sellers say. I'm not saying that they mean anything malicious. I'm just saying that sometimes they don't even know! These people thought they knew, but they didn't.
Rich Jacobson wrote a blog called "Survey Says!" that discusses this topic as well. Check it out.
