The importance and numerous benefits of consulting a Commissioned Land Surveyor.
Who is a Land Surveyor?
- A person of a high standard of education
- Accepts full responsibility for his/her decisions and for the work of others
under his/her direction - A professional Surveyor is competent to apply his/her fundamental education and training to the analysis and solution of surveying problems
- Exercises original thought and judgment
- The Surveyor’s work is predominantly intellectual
- Through his/her education and training he/she should have acquired a broad and general appreciation of the knowledge which constitutes the profession
of a Land Surveyor
Contact a Surveyor
Why?
- To avoid paying for the wrong lot.
- To avoid building on the wrong lot.
- To avoid putting the road or driveway in the most costly location.
- To make the most economical use of the construction site.
- To know who to contact for rights of way.
- To make the most intelligent presentation of your use project.
- To avoid infringing many land use laws, regulations and encumbrances.
When?
- Engaged in any transaction concerning land.
- Locating a house, outbuilding, garage, fence.
- Developing or subdividing land.
- Preparing map for feasibility studies, etc.
- Planning farm water supply or irrigation.
- A dispute over land boundaries occurs.
- A topographical plan or contour is required.
- Registering rights of way and other easements.
- Registering lease of land.
- Layout of construction projects, roads and highways.
- Establishment of volumes in earthworks.
- Relocation of a boundary.
- Sewage and drainage layout.
- Expert Testimony concerning land measurement is required.
Re-establisment of Boundaries
What?
What is a relocation survey?
A relocation survey is one of the many important services provided by a Commissioned surveyor as your land consultant.
Location surveys involve the precise identification of established land boundaries. Knowledge of the exact boundaries of your land will help you avoid expensive encroachment disputes and ill-will between you and your
neighbours.
Where encroachment has already occurred your surveyor can help rectify the problem.
Replace boundary pegs which have become dislodged or misplaced by workmen for any reason whatsoever.
Place additional survey marks consistent with the corners being repegged.
Prepare a plan of the resurveyed boundaries if requested.
Who?
Who can provide this service?
Only a Commissioned Land Surveyor can legally restore the boundaries of your land. Your Commissioned Surveyor has the requisite training and experience to undertake relocation surveys of your land for minimum expense. As a professional, your Commissioned Land Surveyor is also well qualified to provide advice where a dispute over land boundaries has already occurred and if required, provide expert testimony in court.
When?
When is relocation needed?
A relocation survey should be conducted before you engage in any activity that could involve you in a dispute over legal boundaries.
Contact a Commissioned Land Surveyor to avoid unnecessary expense and delay when:
- Purchasing property.
- Developing or subdividing your property.
- Making minor improvements to your property.
- Erecting a fence or wall.
- Constructing a building.
- Excavating near a boundary.
- Undertaking Major Capital Works.
Sale or Purchase of Land
Your house and land may represent your largest assets.
If you are contemplating purchasing property, you should know as much as possible about the price of land you are going to invest in. For your own peace of mind, you need a Commissioned Land Surveyor to define the legal boundaries and verify that the survey pegs are in place. Each sale agreement should require that the survey marks be located prior to the sale. You have a right to see the boundary peg before you purchase, and it is in your interest to do so.
Developing a Section
If you consider developing a section of your property, it is prudent to determine the exact boundaries before you begin. Survey marks may be misplaced, displaced or difficult to locate and boundaries are not necessarily consistent with fences or hedges.
Excavation works on hill sides, on or too near the boundary, may affect the stability of your neighbour's property and make you liable to damages.
Even minor home improvements and the building of a car port can be a source of expensive litigation and ill will, and there are numerous cases of breach of distance covenants requiring modification at great cost in the supreme courts. Be sure, therefore, to avoid the pitfalls be early action. Contact a Commissioned Land Surveyor for redefinition of your boundaries before you commence development.
Re-fencing a Boundary
Many property owners, after a while, seek to erect more substantial fencing. Workmen invariably remove the survey marks in the process of excavation of wall footings and so cause substantial fences to be of uncertain location. Before the new fence, hedge or wall is erected, have a redefinition of boundary done.
Constructing a Building or Major Capital Works
If you plan to construct a building, you should first contract your Commissioned Surveyor. He should be the first professional on the site. He should first redefine the boundaries, then verify that the level referred to in the title is the same level you claim as your own.
You may now require of him, a topographic plan showing orientation, prevailing winds, etc.
It should be noted that certificates of title do not always show exactly the space available on earth, and to proceed with designs before the Surveyor is brought in, could result in costly delays.
When large expenditure is being made for infrastructure and other engineering works, it is imperative that the boundaries be redefined. Using a fence as a guide to approximate boundaries, can have expensive consequences. The cost of redefining these boundaries is always an insignificant fraction of the project cost and ensures against expensive litigation and compensation for encroachments.
Survey Marks
Survey marks are protected under the law. Nevertheless, it is in the interest of each property owner to locate the ones affecting his property and see to their proper maintenance and preservation, and promptly contact your
commissioned surveyor for replacement as soon as a mark id damaged or replaced. The Land Surveyors Association strongly recommends that constant vigilance be exercised by property owners in preservation of survey boundary marks against excavators with heavy machinery, encroachers and vandals, and in so doing save himself much cost and many sorrows later.
The Law
The Commissioned Land Surveyor Practices under Law 31 of 1942, Law 16 of 1944 and the Land Surveyors Regulations of 1971, which require accurate results of him or her at the expense of a licence to practice.
Surveyors now also practice under the Land Surveyors Amendment Act. 2005.
Any person who has a complaint of negligence or professional misconduct may refer the matter to the Land Surveyors Board for redress and any person who falsely holds himself out to be a Commissioned Land Surveyor is guilty of an offence.
Fees
Every Commissioned Surveyor shall, subject to any special agreement to the contrary, be entitled to recover such fees as may be agreed with the client.
Engagement of a Surveyor
There are Commissioned Land Surveyors located in the following major towns: Kingston, Spanish Town, May Pen, Mandeville, Savanna-la-mar, Montego Bay, Falmouth, Ocho Rios, and Port Antonio. Advice on the selection of a firm of surveyors, an individual surveyor in or near your district or information about the Association and the work and training of its members may be obtained from: members may be obtained from:
The Secretary
The Land Surveyors Association of Jamaica
Suite #9A
The Trade Centre
30-32 Red Hills Road
Jamaica W.I.
Tel: (876) 754-6912/754-6913
Fax: (876) 920-3650
E-mail: lsaj@cwjamaica.com