Empty lot gets stolen and someone builds a house on it. UH OH

street said:
Interesting and I also know that happens more than the general public hear about.

Title/abstract with the insurance is a must. Here in the west fence lines and what you think is a property line aren't even close in a lot of cases. A lot was homesteaded and roughed out and never was surveyed with good instruments of measurement in those days.

The other thing rivers and landscape has changed things through the last 200 years. It really can be a nightmare.
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The land my house sits on goes back to the first settlers right after the Feds put the Ute on reservations. I picture someone living in an adobe hut or log cabin. If they only knew that now the land all around me is worth mega millions. They would never have believed it.
 
I understand that some counties allow property owners to be on a notification list that contacts them when any changes to the title of the property are made. The idea is to catch fraudulent changes early.

I would be curious if others have this service available to them, if they have used it, and if the service had a triggering event that caused them to be contacted.
 
Around here, buying a home in a new subdivision, the property boundary plat you get is usually from the builder and is not a surveyed and stamped (by an engineer) certified property survey. A buyer can accept this plat and usually does. I did, a couple of times, and when I sold, it was no big deal.
 
How does title insurance not protect the buyer? From what I read,
Notably, title insurance protects you financially in the event there are hidden liens, errors in public records and other types of ownership
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Yes, the builder would be out his construction expenses to date and costs to return the property to its previous state. I would think that it would cover his purchase price of the land back. I admit that I am a neophyte in this area. I may have to go and read my title insurance policy to see exactly what my coverage really is.
 
DFW_M5 said:
It's hard to believe things like this happen, but they do. Then you have cases of going away on vacation only to find a squatter living in your home and the squatters seem to have more rights than the owner:facepalm:
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I've read about those cases and it mystifies me. In MD, it would be a clear case of burglary and trespassing. Any conflicting claims about who owned what would be cleared up by a quick trip to the county courthouse. If the situation warranted someone would be called out in the wee hours.

But obviously state laws differ widely.
 
CRLLS said:
How does title insurance not protect the buyer? From what I read,

Yes, the builder would be out his construction expenses to date and costs to return the property to its previous state. I would think that it would cover his purchase price of the land back. I admit that I am a neophyte in this area. I may have to go and read my title insurance policy to see exactly what my coverage really is.
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Interesting question... maybe he did not buy any...


I had it for my house and they had to pay an old tax bill that was missed...
 
street said:
Interesting and I also know that happens more than the general public hear about.

Title/abstract with the insurance is a must. Here in the west fence lines and what you think is a property line aren't even close in a lot of cases. A lot was homesteaded and roughed out and never was surveyed with good instruments of measurement in those days.

The other thing rivers and landscape has changed things through the last 200 years. It really can be a nightmare.
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The youth summer camp I volunteer for has the original title/survey description posted in their office. This was from the early 1970s. It has descriptions like: " The south corner is 20 ft noth of Mrs. Marshall's dogwood tree.". Yikes! Fortunately, a new survey with proper markers was done in the 80s.

Your point is well taken.
 
JoeWras said:
The youth summer camp I volunteer for has the original title/survey description posted in their office. This was from the early 1970s. It has descriptions like: " The south corner is 20 ft noth of Mrs. Marshall's dogwood tree.". Yikes! Fortunately, a new survey with proper markers was done in the 80s.

Your point is well taken.
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Yes, they used rocks here from the corner of the rock so many feet this and that way. Also, rocks were placed where the corners are/were, and marking have been removed or taken away etc.

A tree was used in the description on my land as a marker as well. It was a tree by itself on top of a high ridge where you could see to the next detailed natural spot for description of the property line. From that tree it was 4 feet east of tree. Lol

When I purchased some land a few years back we had to work of off old survey and property lines to come up with a legal boundary. One side was the Yellowstone River which has changed and changes constantly. Also a ditch that is used for irrigation put in the late 20's early 30's and things have changed on that and has very crude survey to begin with.

My last survey I helped with, and it was a nightmare in rough and high country all most all was by foot packing equipment in and out. Places I never will most likely never be back too on my own property.
 
Abraham Lincoln’s birthplace in Kentucky was a property that was subject to a title claim. I’ve read that Abe’s father had to vacate the property and he moved his family to Louisville. He then went in search for properties in Indiana that were being sold by the land banks. He found a property, bought it, and returned to Louisville and moved his family to the new place.

Abe’s birthplace has the survey posted in the visitor center. One property corner is described as an oak tree, known in surveying circles as the boundary oak. It fell due to lightning in the 80’s and now a survey monument is in the stump of the boundary oak.
 
street said:
Yes, they used rocks here from the corner of the rock so many feet this and that way. Also, rocks were placed where the corners are/were, and marking have been removed or taken away etc.

A tree was used in the description on my land as a marker as well. It was a tree by itself on top of a high ridge where you could see to the next detailed natural spot for description of the property line. From that tree it was 4 feet east of tree. Lol

When I purchased some land a few years back we had to work of off old survey and property lines to come up with a legal boundary. One side was the Yellowstone River which has changed and changes constantly. Also a ditch that is used for irrigation put in the late 20's early 30's and things have changed on that and has very crude survey to begin with.

My last survey I helped with, and it was a nightmare in rough and high country all most all was by foot packing equipment in and out. Places I never will most likely never be back too on my own property.
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Your property with its water boundaries can cause title and survey problems. Property lines that are waterways move with the waterways if the movement is gradual. Not so if the movement is sudden - flash flood etc. the first Capitol of Illinois - Kaskaskia was on the East bank of the Mississippi. It’s now west of the current location of the Mississippi, but still part of Illinois due to the sudden change in the river location, leaving the boundary line in the original location of the river.
 
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OHHH, funny stuff...



I remember seeing on the TV here where they will say 'starting at the rod' or something to that effect... but what if you use your metal detector and find the wrong rod!!! That was a dispute that was on the news and then someone came out and found the correct rod.. dispute fixed..
 
^^^^ hopefully the deed description follows up with a bearing and distance to the next angle point in the property. Then you can usually figure out which rod is correct based on how well the measured lines match the bearings and distances in the deed. Sometimes that doesn’t work though.
 
We have those deeds with landmarks like a tree or a drainage ditch. I can trace my own deed back to one with things like that.

I'm not sure I fully sympathize with the "victim" in the original story. I see lots of neglected properties, sometimes of some value. Why? If you don't want to maintain it, just sell it. The builder offered to pay more than the property was worth to make it right for the owner. But the owner refused, and instead sued to have it "restored" to it's original condition. Who's going to pay for that? It wasn't the builder's fault. Maybe it was the realtor's or lawyer's fault. The courts will have to decide that. But I think the owner was at least partly responsible, and the builder's proposed remedy was more than fair. Instead, everyone loses here. Except the lawyers.
 
Official records are sometimes lacking.
I used to own some property in Colorado, and when I listed it for sale many years later, the county clerk sent me a bill for the tax payment of the year I bought it, along with compounded interest for all the intervening years.

I mailed back a photocopy of the letter they had sent me initially, showing that the year in question had been paid, and they replied with essentially "Sorry about that. Never mind."

It was definitely a wise move to save that old letter.
 
CaptTom said:
We have those deeds with landmarks like a tree or a drainage ditch. I can trace my own deed back to one with things like that.

I'm not sure I fully sympathize with the "victim" in the original story. I see lots of neglected properties, sometimes of some value. Why? If you don't want to maintain it, just sell it. The builder offered to pay more than the property was worth to make it right for the owner. But the owner refused, and instead sued to have it "restored" to it's original condition. Who's going to pay for that? It wasn't the builder's fault. Maybe it was the realtor's or lawyer's fault. The courts will have to decide that. But I think the owner was at least partly responsible, and the builder's proposed remedy was more than fair. Instead, everyone loses here. Except the lawyers.
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I had a vacant lot in FL that I sold some years ago just to avoid this kind of madness. I inherited this near-swampland.

It was before the recent run up, so I sold it to a broker for a fire sale.

I actually do not regret that at all. Glad to have it off my hands.
 
Chuckanut said:
I understand that some counties allow property owners to be on a notification list that contacts them when any changes to the title of the property are made. The idea is to catch fraudulent changes early.

I would be curious if others have this service available to them, if they have used it, and if the service had a triggering event that caused them to be contacted.
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Yes. My county - Fulton County in Georgia - DOES have this service. It's free, and I've subscribed to it.
And it DOES work.
When I changed title on a townhouse I inherited from my mom recently I got a notice that the title on the townhouse had changed. I had wonderred if I was going to get a notice and was very pleased that I did.

SO if you have this service availble to you I would highly recommend you sign up.

I would very much recommend AGAINST any "title lock" junk that's being advertised on the TV or radio though, as that, from what I've read has been proven to be worthless. Your best bet is to check the property records online yourself frequently.
 
The title insurance will probably also not help the hapless buyer, since it is typically issued with a policy limit based on the purchase price - in this case, the price of an empty lot.
 
CRLLS said:
How does title insurance not protect the buyer? From what I read,

Yes, the builder would be out his construction expenses to date and costs to return the property to its previous state. I would think that it would cover his purchase price of the land back. I admit that I am a neophyte in this area. I may have to go and read my title insurance policy to see exactly what my coverage really is.
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I don't think title insurance would pay if fraud is involved, but I think the title search might ferret out a problem with the imposter posing as rightful owner. I wonder if any mortgages were involved. We were sued for a title defect on a property that had been sold twice and mortgaged 4 times without ever uncovering the defect. Plaintiff bought for cash out of foreclosure and only found the problem when they decided to get a mortgage for a major home improvement.
 
Fraud, not a title insurance failure

Both the original owner and the buyer are victims of someone who impersonated the owner to the lawyer who represented him in the sale. The scammer didn't need to change the title to his name. He only had to convince his attorney he was the owner of record with false ID documents. I'm sure he didn't appear for the closing since he likely gave his lawyer power of attorney for the transaction. After fooling only that one person (his attorney), he was never seen again. Audaciously simple enough to succeed.

Re: property lines. I used to be realtor in Wyoming and in that state, over time the existing fence lines become the legal property lines. It pays not to skimp on a new survey when you buy property.
 
I just sold a piece of property recently. Went to closing to sign the paperwork and it was messed up. The address on the contract was different than the one on the deed. I owned both properties but the one on the deed was the wrong one and the better property. The title co told me they looked over the paperwork as well as their attorney and somehow they both missed it. So be careful out there.
 
I sold a right of way to the city were I live so that they could put in a turning lane. they had surveyors come and mark the boundaries of their purchase. I had stipulated that if they did not have 5 feet of green space between the curb and sidewalk, snow removal on that property would be the responsibility of the city. when the actual surveying was done I pointed out to public works that the way the right of way was layed out they would not have the needed green space. the point is that when the city had problems getting the property they needed they just had the surveyor come and recheck and conveniently their former measurements were a few feet off and they now had what they needed. cities and engineers work together to get what they need and unless you want to spend a ton of money to fight for the extra few feet, you are pretty much done for. during this turning lane construction my property line moved 3 times,
 
frank said:
I sold a right of way to the city were I live so that they could put in a turning lane. they had surveyors come and mark the boundaries of their purchase. I had stipulated that if they did not have 5 feet of green space between the curb and sidewalk, snow removal on that property would be the responsibility of the city. when the actual surveying was done I pointed out to public works that the way the right of way was layed out they would not have the needed green space. the point is that when the city had problems getting the property they needed they just had the surveyor come and recheck and conveniently their former measurements were a few feet off and they now had what they needed. cities and engineers work together to get what they need and unless you want to spend a ton of money to fight for the extra few feet, you are pretty much done for. during this turning lane construction my property line moved 3 times,
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The big problem with dealing with the city is they always have the upper hand... they can always take your property by eminent domain... also forcing them to do snow removal might be hard if they do not want to do it....



Also, getting them to do what is required is hard... one of my sisters live at the bottom of a hill with a creek and green space behind her house... all the leaves wash down and clog the drain at the bottom creating a small pond... she can call all the time to get them out to clean it out but they ignore her all the time...
 
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