Here are answers to some questions we commonly receive at Higgins Surveying, followed by links to other surveying companies who have prepared comprehensive FAQs of their own. Please let us know if you have additional questions.

A realtor marked my corners with flagging to help me see my property boundaries. Is that a legal survey?

• These days, most realtors are aware that this practice does not constitute a legal surey and they are advised not to mark your corners in any way, even though they are doing it as a courtesy to you and potential buyers. Only a registered land surveyor can verify the location of your corners.

 

How do you mark my corners?

• We set a piece of 1/2" rebar whenever possible, topped with a plastic cap that bears my R.L.S. number. Then we put a piece of 24" lath nearby and even a piece of flagging on a nearby tree or shrub. If the property corner is in rock, we chisel in the corner however we can, marking it with a nail or in some other way.

 

I think my corner is right around here some where, so I put a piece of pipe in the ground. Will that help you out?

• When property owners unwittingly set out some kind of marker in the general vicinity of their property corners, it may end up adding to the cost of chasing out your actual corners. The survey party has to spend extra time trying to determine where the original corners were, and a well-meaning homeowner who sets a piece of pipe or rebar where they think the corner might be may just serve to add time to the process since may serve to confuse.

 

Why do I have to have another survey performed when I just had it done five years ago?

• When you consider all the factors that could have disturbed your corners in that five year period, you may realize that accepting that old survey could present problems. If you or a neighbor has added landscaping, a fence or other structure, a garden, or if you have incurred severe weather your original corners may have been disturbed and thus need to be relocated.

• Kent W Cox and Associates
• Arpenteurs Professional Surveying
• Land Surveyor US
• Professional Land Surveyors of Arizona