DIGGING INTO PROPERTY EASEMENTS—ANYONE ELSE FIND ONLINE TOOLS CONFUSING?
Funny you mention the old pins—when we built our place, I spent a whole afternoon hunting for them in the brush, only to find out later one was actually a chunk of rebar from an old fence. The online maps helped me get close, but nothing lined up exactly. Ended up hiring a surveyor just to be safe since I didn’t want to risk building a fence in the wrong spot. It’s wild how much “gray area” there is with something that seems like it should be black and white.
DIGGING INTO PROPERTY EASEMENTS—ANYONE ELSE FIND ONLINE TOOLS CONFUSING?
That “gray area” you mentioned is spot on. I’ve run into the same thing more times than I care to admit—especially when clients show me those county GIS maps and expect them to be gospel. The reality is, most of those online tools are only as accurate as the data they’re built on, and a lot of it’s just digitized from old paper surveys. You zoom in and suddenly the property line jumps a few feet depending on the layer. Super frustrating if you’re trying to make decisions about where to build or plant.
I’m always surprised how many folks assume those pins are still in the right spot after decades. Between shifting soil, landscaping, and random junk (like your rebar), it’s almost a coin toss whether they’re even findable. I had a project where we found three different “corner markers” within a 10-foot radius—one was an actual survey pin, one was a bent piece of pipe, and one was just a rock someone painted red. Not exactly confidence-inspiring.
Honestly, hiring a surveyor is probably the best move if you’re doing anything permanent near a boundary or easement. It’s not cheap, but it beats tearing down a fence or getting into it with neighbors later. I do wish there were more reliable digital resources though... seems like with all our tech, we should have figured this out by now. Maybe it’s just that land records are still kind of old-school at their core.
Curious if anyone’s found an online tool that actually lines up with what’s on the ground? Or is everyone else just using them for rough estimates and then double-checking with a pro?
Honestly, hiring a surveyor is probably the best move if you’re doing anything permanent near a boundary or easement. It’s not cheap, but it beats tearing down a fence or getting into it with neighbors later.
Couldn’t agree more on that point. I’ve yet to see an online tool that’s truly reliable for anything beyond a ballpark estimate. Even the “official” county GIS layers are all over the place—sometimes they’re off by several feet, which is a big deal if you’re planning a build. I’ve had projects where the digital map and the actual survey didn’t even remotely match up. At this point, I treat those tools as rough guides and always budget for a proper survey before breaking ground. The tech just isn’t there yet, at least not for anything high-stakes.
Even the “official” county GIS layers are all over the place—sometimes they’re off by several feet, which is a big deal if you’re planning a build.
Yeah, I’ve noticed that too. I tried using the county’s online map to figure out where my back fence should go, and it was off by almost four feet compared to the surveyor’s stakes. That’s not just a little margin of error when you’re dealing with setbacks or easements. I wish the tech was more accurate, but for now, I just treat those maps like a rough sketch... handy for getting started, but nowhere near good enough for anything permanent.
It’s wild how much those “official” maps can differ from reality. I ran into this exact problem last year when I was redoing my driveway—pulled up the GIS parcel lines on my phone, but when the surveyor came out, he laughed and pointed out the line was almost three feet off. That could have put my concrete right into the utility easement, which would’ve been a nightmare down the road.
I get that these digital maps are meant to be a convenience, but honestly, I think they give a false sense of precision. It’s like, if you see a line on a county website, you just assume it’s gospel. But clearly, it’s not. Has anyone actually tried to get the county to clarify or correct these layers? Or is it just one of those things where you have to bite the bullet and pay for a real survey every time you want to do anything legit? I’m curious if anyone’s had luck getting more accurate info from the county directly, or if that’s just wishful thinking.
