Latitude and Longitude location

[Wayne Tomlinson]

Couch, you have to have a sense of where the property is to use Google if you don't have the coordinates.

In the area where I work, I use plat books extensively, the USDA maps and a lot of recollection.

Sometimes when looking for comps, I have used bulldozer marks to identify the properties.

Where a farm has sold, ofteh the buyer has a bull dozer in to rip out the fences or brush and when you find that, you have found your comp.

Wayne Tomlinson

 

[Wayne Tomlinson]

Jerry, If you are interested in commercial, then you have an address, I assume.

MapQuest has improved greatly in the past year.

I often put in the address, then the site has been improved so that you can move around easily with the cursor and make it larger etc, much better than before.

Click on the aerial button at the top right of the picture and turn on the aerial.

It is cheap and can print out a good picture.

Tim,
The Web soil survey aslo will give a good amount of information.
Wayne Tomlinson

 

[Thomas N. Morgan]

Jerry,

When you say "vacant land" and "commercial" appraisals, what are you talking about?

And are you merely trying to find out if you are on the land, or are trying to find each corner?

As a real estate salesman and an appraiser of vacant acreage (pasture land, old cropland, timber, vacant residential lots, I managed to find them without a GPS.

A combination of Aerial photos and USGS Topo maps, Tax Assessor's ownership maps, street and highway maps, all used at one time or another did the job for me. No GPS back then, and no street addresses.

There isn't any one best way to find and appraise vacant land.

 

[Couch Potato]

Couch, you have to have a sense of where the property is to use Google if you don't have the coordinates.

Given that he said he had a map of the property location in MLS, I assume he has a general idea of where it is. Google Earth shows the longitude and latitude when the Grid is turned on, so that would seem to be one method to meet the need.

Very likely his MLS map also has a setting to view a similar grid.

 

[Jerry Lieb]

USDA Map

Wayne - My fax is 951-572-3348, if you care to fax me a sample of the USDA map you are talking about. Thanks very much!

My problem is that I do not have a street address on many of the remote acreage I am asked to appraise. Most of it is in the Southern California desert - Mojave Desert. All I am provided is an assessor's parcel number and county data - which does not include a street or street address, because there are usually no streets nearby, and therefore no street addresses.

Until a few weeks ago, I didn't have a problem whatsoever...! Our MLS (in their infinite wisdom) no longer offers a feature called "SmartMap" which allowed one to simply enter a parcel number and immediately go to an aerial view, with the assessor's parcel map outlining the property, and easily locate latitude and longitude points just by moving the cursor to each corner. It was wonderful.

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Thomas - I think its great that you can locate property without a GPS. I do believe that if you were in the middle of the Mojave Desert, with no streets, the closest road a mile away, and one patch of sand looking pretty much like the patch of sand next to it, you would definitely want to use a GPS.

 

[Couch Potato]

Jerry, as a land owner in California City, I understand exactly what you are up against.

You had a nice, easy method of locating property and now you are looking at 30 minute to an hour to accomplish the same task that took seconds.

 

[Jerry Lieb]

Couch - I'm glad you understand my problem....!

It used to be a "snap" finding property corners using my handheld. I'd drive as close as possible, then walk with my handheld until I found the corners. Many times, only one corner is necessary, as I could stand on that corner - using a compass - and estimate where the property was from that vantage point.

My handheld is accurate to 28 feet - which, on say a 100 acre parcel - is close enough for my purpose.

 

[Thomas N. Morgan]

Jerry,

Now I understand. Having been out of sight of land way out in the in the Gulf of Mexico, I can appreciate your problem.

 

[Wayne Tomlinson]

Jerry, I will fax a photo. They usually are so dark that they are of little use, but at least you can get an idea what they look like.

Wayne Tomlinson

 

[Zambendorf]

Parcel Boundaries

I haven't found a source that has 100% coverage for the parcel boundaries polygons layers to overlay on satellite imagery. They're like Flod zone layers as far as the computer is concerned, the vendor just has to purchase the rights to the source files and integrate them.

In populated areas, the vendors will invest to bring these in, the farther out you go, the more issues you'll have with coverage.

Try Digital Map Products and see if they have good coverage in your area.