Title title

I don’t know about other surveyors, but I seems to run into title problem a lot. At least more than I like.

It is one of the problem I see increasing every day, and I wrote about a similar problem before. The purchaser got a conveyance deed in  another name, and years later, they changed their name, so now, the title company shows the new name as the owner.

On the survey map, I can only show the conveyance deed, and shows the new name/address on the title block. The survey map satisfy the requirement of title company and was fine.

Now, the engineer plan that also shows the conveyance deed of the tract, submit to city, and then the checker has comments like, the plat should show the new name. Of course, the engineer will point to the surveyor, that is the information from me.

No, I’m not changing my survey map (it is not even a redline for my map). Yes, of course I want to show the conveyance deed on the plans. I mean, I would be real frustrating if I see a deed info on a plan and it turns out a deed just saying A change name to B, and there is no information about the tract of land itself. What is really the point in that?

Then there is another problem about the boundary line with the title company. The line between two lots is a gully, the lots are in a subdivision created in the 40s. Twenty years later, the city placed a storm culvert pipe under the gully and filled up the gully. Forty more years later, yours truly came in and performed a survey holding the culvert line.

Title company called me up, and said the gully on the plat (a wiggly line represent the gully with no dimension in 1940s) should be the lot line, not a straight line. Of course, I told him about the riparian boundary, as the water naturally changes, so is boundary, and the culvert is the last evidence of the natural gully on the ground.

All the deeds of these two lots always described as Lot 1 and/or Lot 2 of La La Land subdivision. Title is like, what document to show that this straight line is the boundary line. I can only show the city plans from 1960s, where the culvert was built and show the gully was straight at that time.

The title wanted a boundary agreement between two lots.