Course Description
A legal description is the specific language, found in a deed, plat, or other recorded instrument, that identifies a particular parcel of land with the precision the law requires to distinguish it from every other parcel in existence. Every survey a surveyor performs, and every deed a client relies upon, ultimately traces back to this written description, and a description that is ambiguous, internally inconsistent, or simply incorrect can create problems that persist for decades after the surveyor who wrote it has moved on to other work. This course examines what makes a legal description defensible, meaning capable of surviving scrutiny by a court, a title examiner, or a future surveyor working from the same document decades later. The course begins by examining the several distinct types of legal descriptions a surveyor is likely to encounter or prepare, including metes and bounds descriptions, lot and block references to a recorded plat, and descriptions based on the rectangular survey system. It then examines the specific elements that make a metes and bounds description defensible, including proper point of beginning language, closure, and internal consistency between courses and distances. From there, the course addresses the common errors and ambiguities that undermine legal descriptions in practice, and the review procedures a surveyor should apply before a description is finalized and delivered. The course closes with an examination of special situations, including descriptions involving exceptions and reservations, curved boundaries, and other complexities that arise in ordinary practice.