Property Lines

When building a deck, garage or addition, it is necessary to establish where your lot lines are. This provides the evidence your building inspector needs to verify that a project is within the setbacks required by zoning laws and building codes. Building outside setbacks or over property lines that you wrongly assumed may result in moving or disassembling your project. This can be costly and time consuming. If you don’t know, you should investigate by using one or more of the methods described below.  The City of Sauk Rapids does not provide this service. 

Usually property lines are casually delineated by where your neighbor or you cut your grass, plant flower beds or maintain a fence. These borders may not be the property lines.  Even if your neighbor is in agreement that this is the property line, problems may arise when either property is sold and property lines are found not to be where assumed.  Do not assume that the alley pavement or sidewalk edge is the property line. In most cases the actual property line is one to three feet from the sidewalk or alley pavement. Street curbs are also almost never at property lines.

 

The first step in finding your property lines is to determine the dimensions of your lot. If you have a certificate of survey with the as-built location of the house, you can measure from the house to find the property line.  Use caution when using a certificate of survey because some will show the proposed location of the house when it was built rather than the actual location. The next step is to locate the survey pins located at the corners of your lot. You may ask your neighbor if they have recently located them. This may save you the trouble of finding them yourself. If no one knows where they are, you can use a shovel to probe the area of ground where they are assumed to be. (They may be a foot or more below grade) If that proves fruitless, you may need to use a metal detector to find them.

 

Many lots in Sauk Rapids were surveyed years ago and some survey pins may have been removed.  If this is the case, lot lines may be reestablished by measuring from the neighbors opposite pins if they allow you to locate them or any pins on the block whose location is known. If by these methods the property lines cannot be found, you may have to hire a surveyor to survey your lot and put in new pins. The City of Sauk Rapids does not provide this service and you will be responsible for the cost of a new survey.