So this should be fun.

Girlfriend's house is a garden home (about 5ft between houses). The old lady next has finally gone to a nursing home, so the old lady's kids are selling her house.

For some reason they (the kids) paid for a property survey before putting the house on the market. It turns out that my girlfriends AC compressor pad is 5 inches over the property line. The AC compressor pad that has been there since the house was build in the mid/late 90s (25+ years). The pad has been there the entire time the old lady has lived there.

So this morning my girlfriend gets a text from the old lady's kids saying "your AC pad is over the property line, you need to move it so we can close next week"

I told the gf to ignore the txt and if they come knocking on the door to just respond with "you might want to ask your attorney about "adverse possession" before we discuss this any further. "

Seems like it would apply except that I'm assuming your girlfriend hasn't owned the house for 20 years. That might be a gray area

I don't think that will apply.

There isn't 5 inches to move it. It would mean moving it to the other side of the house. So at least as much as it would cost to move the compressor and replumb the lines to the otherside of the house. And since it is a corner house and that side is a street facing side of the house, I am not sure the HOA rules would permit that

Their attorney, if they retain one, will probably throw out some sort of dollar figure for you to pay them in order to not take it to court.

If the buyer is getting a loan it won't matter if it's a buyer issue....it'll matter if it's a lender issue. I'm sure a quick conversation with a real estate attorney will provide several solutions, but I wouldn't just ignore the issue and hope it goes away.

This isn't in Texas so keep that in mind.

But found out today that property lines are kind of a suggestion in this state.

There is another house on the same street that apparently has one corner that is on the neighbors property. Not a fence corner but the actual corner of the house is over the property line. Another has their patio extending past the property line. And the other neighbor to old lady's house from the op has their fence 12-18" over the line. And they kids havent said crap to those neighbors. Instead of being worried about the 30 linear feet of fence being a foot over the line, they are worried about the linear inches of the slab that is 5inches over the line.

The girlfriend inherited the house from her mom and I have no idea what either one of them could have done to piss the kids off that much.

The survey from when the deed was transferred to her mother's estate shows the AC pad over the line.

This is an HOA? Definitely gonna cause a stink with moving it

Who told them that it has to be moved? The buyer? I would just leave it as an exception to the title policy and get on with life.

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The buyer? I would just leave it as an exception to the title policy and get on with life.

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Or, just tell them you will be happy to sign a boundary line agreement.

**** em. Pay 40k to a lawyer and show them who's boss!

Or find out if y'all can just sign affidavits and throw an exception on the title policy that will satisfy lenders.

Mas89 said:

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Not uncommon for the person surveying to be off. Where is the gf survey? I would want to confirm that they found the correct corners. Can't tell you how many times I've dealt with a bad survey from a neighboring tract. Often times it was because they did not take the time/ effort to find the corners in the call/ legal description but instead "built them in". Usually the surveyor that signed the bad survey was never even out on the property surveyed. Only the "crew".

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Sorry but you are saying it's common for surveyors to be off? That's not likely. There are bad apples in every profession but I disagree with the statement in general. What is the correct corner? The answer is what was originally set. Are they still there?

I will tell you in my experience landowners and fence contractors remove those property corners all the time and it's infuriating. FYI it is against the law to disturb/remove a property corner. However, people do it and make the surveyors job that much harder. They then complain about the surveyor being off.

Some of the off ones I've recently dealt with had a section corner in the middle of a county road. The crews just didn't locate it. Requires some tough digging. They had some neighboring surveys and built in the section corner off those. They were wrong.

One of the worst was a surveyor signing local surveys while living out of state. Not even directly supervising the crew.

I'm very lucky to have a great surveyor who found the actual corners and is willing to call bs on the bad ones. And explain why their survey is not correct.

Mas89 said:

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Some of the off ones I've recently dealt with had a section corner in the middle of a county road. The crews just didn't locate it. Requires some tough digging. They had some neighboring surveys and built in the section corner off those. They were wrong.

One of the worst was a surveyor signing local surveys while living out of state. Not even directly supervising the crew.

I'm very lucky to have a great surveyor who found the actual corners and is willing to call bs on the bad ones. And explain why their survey is not correct.

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I agree with your first statement, if there was a corner there it should have been located. But I emphatically disagree with your second statement. This is the 21st century, I don't need to be there with my crew to make sure the job is done correctly. We can email files back and forth, text pictures and even FaceTime. Sure there are bad surveyors out there, but your assertion that any surveyor who isn't on-site is a bad one is laughable. Honestly, one of the worst surveyors I've followed is a guy that does his own fieldwork.

Just curious - the OP stated that the old lady's kids are stating they cannot close on the sale due to the pad being over the property line. Is that because the buyers are refusing to close due to this or is there some legal reason or holdup at the title company?

I ask because a portion of the fence/gate across my driveway runs 6' into my neighbors property and ends right next to their house. It is a swinging gate for cars, plus a man gate right next to it. The man gate is attached to a post that is set wiithin about 1" of their exterior wall. It was installed years before I bought the house. I keep it unlocked and tell the neighbors they are free to go through it if they ever need to.

I had no issues purchasing my house. The neighbors house has been sold twice since I lived here and didn't hear about any issues.

TexAg2001 said:

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Just curious - the OP stated that the old lady's kids are stating they cannot close on the sale due to the pad being over the property line. Is that because the buyers are refusing to close due to this or is there some legal reason or holdup at the title company?

I had no issues purchasing my house. The neighbors house has been sold twice since I lived here and didn't hear about any issues.

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Some lenders freak out about such things. Some do not. Fencing really isn't an issue in almost all cases though. It's very common for them to not be on the property line in older neighborhoods.

That's not much help I know.

For the pad I wouldn't anticipate having to do much, if anything to fix this issue. It's long standing and honestly not a big deal.

Turns out the buyers and the gf are in a Bible study together.

So we will see.

TexAg2001 said:

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Just curious - the OP stated that the old lady's kids are stating they cannot close on the sale due to the pad being over the property line. Is that because the buyers are refusing to close due to this or is there some legal reason or holdup at the title company?

I ask because a portion of the fence/gate across my driveway runs 6' into my neighbors property and ends right next to their house. It is a swinging gate for cars, plus a man gate right next to it. The man gate is attached to a post that is set wiithin about 1" of their exterior wall. It was installed years before I bought the house. I keep it unlocked and tell the neighbors they are free to go through it if they ever need to.

I had no issues purchasing my house. The neighbors house has been sold twice since I lived here and didn't hear about any issues.

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I would guess that title company saw it on survey and took exception in title commitment and buyers lender is being rigid. Seems like a minimal encroachment that at most should settled with boundary line agreement. I don't really think adverse possession comes in to play in this situation (but not sure I guess depending on what state this is in).

I would do an easement over a boundary line agreement

True, easement language could be included in BLA as well and I was assuming that if AC is encroaching there is also an issue with fence not being on property line, but that may not be valid assumption. In any event various ways to address the issue short of moving the compressor.

I'm not a lawyer and this is not legal advice.

Adverse possession claims in Texas generally require that the possessor have been paying property taxes on the property in question for a minimum of 10 years. I would guess other states are similar, so if she hasn't been paying taxes on the five inches, she likely has no claim to the land.

As for surveys, I have consistently been told by surveyors I know that no one cares about anything within 6 inches of the property line most of the time. For example, fences that are within 6 inches of the property line are usually drawn on the property line on the survey.

If one or both parties to the sale of the house next door are concerned enough about the pad to raise hell about it, I would tell them to have a licensed surveyor come out to uncover the pins and run a line between them to prove the pad is over the line. That's probably going to cost them at least $300.

On an aside, if it's the buyers raising the issue, then she's in for some fun with ****ty neighbors.

Tell the buyers to tell their bank to approve the survey or they will find another lender.

Folks do not give advice for a Texas property because it's not. And since we don't know which state and which rules to apply not much help. Keep in mind only about 7-10 states depend on surveys like we do as legal boundaries

Lenders really don't care much about this, title companies do. So contact them and ask what cures they can provide and costs. Go from there.