Minimal Standards in Land Surveying

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Minimal Standards in Land Surveying

Land surveyors are accustomed to make accurate measurements of your land. You might have a land survey done before you purchase the house or as you choose to build onto it. Clearly, it is important to have a qualified land surveyor working on the survey. A land surveyor's accuracy requires that minimum standards must be met, so as to ensure that the survey is correct. The minimal standards for land surveying vary across states and countries. In the U.S., land surveyors are licensed on a state-by-state basis, meaning that the minimal standards may actually vary greatly.

Most states' minimal standards for surveying require that the surveyor offers a complete and unequivocal definition of land boundaries with enough information to allow the description to be plotted. Generally, this legal description must follow one of the surveying standards, such as the Public Land Survey System, or the metes and bounds system, which describes how such measurements should be taken and described. Between  Residential Surveyors Greasby , there is very little variation in relation to how this information is to be presented.

Ahead of beginning a survey, it is standard for a land surveyor to research background data, such as for example property deeds or old surveys, to find out what's already known concerning the property. The surveyor must utilize this information when determining the logical procedure for conducting a survey of the land.

Although they are general rules for conducting a survey, the guidelines set forth by many states go into much greater detail. Most state requirements outline the minimal standards for conducting the actual land survey, as well. These may include searching thoroughly for past surveying monuments, cooperating with appropriate public officials, and making sufficient measurements to be able to verify that the work is accurate. In the course of the survey, a surveyor must often set monuments to record the boundaries on the physical property. Other requirements may outline exactly what material should be used for the monuments.

Some states go so far as to stipulate just how the maps are to be drawn, in an effort to standardize the procedure. These specific rules help ensure that land surveys done by two separate surveyors should be as identical as possible.


Most states require land surveyors to record their notes as they work, in a fashion that would be intelligible to another surveyor. In the event that the existing surveyor disagrees with a previous survey, the present surveyor should contact the previous surveyor and try to resolve the issue.

Land surveyors must be licensed in hawaii in which they work. The licensing requirements generally add a test, that will require knowledge of minimal standards of land surveying as they are lay out in the laws for that particular state. These guidelines often include ethical statements, such as stipulations that the minimal requirements should not be accepted as the only standard for the practice of land surveying. Other professional conduct standards written for land surveyors may address issues such as conflict of interest or knowingly signing off on a survey that does follow minimum standards.