WHEN BUYING LAND, MAKE A REGISTERED SURVEY PLAN BEFORE PAYING
A Survey Plan is a land document that contains an accurate size, description, location and boundary of land.
Knowing the true size and exact location of land is important. The Survey Plan also shows your boundaries on all sides and fully captures your name and access roads of the land.
Engage the services of a Registered Surveyor and ensure the Survey Plan is registered with the Ministry of Lands and Survey.
A Property and Real Estate Lawyer will help you confirm if the Survey Plan is truly registered.
An unregistered Survey Plan is called a Site Plan. It of no use and is as good as not making a Survey Plan at all.
So avoid unregistered Surveyors and quacks in the field of survey, as they will charge you less, but at the end you have done nothing.
If what you end up with is an unregistered Survey Plan, then be sure that you do not have a Survey Plan at all. There are no short cuts here, so do not cheat yourself.
Note that the Deed of Conveyance or Deed of Transfer (legal documents of transfer of ownership of land or house) will make reference to the details in the Survey Plan.
So if the Survey Plan turns out to be invalid for not being registered, the transfer document is invalid as it can’t stand on its own.
You can’t base your ownership on an invalid document. It doesn’t work that way.
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APEX CHAMBERS, Law Firm of Property/Real Estate and Business/Corporate /Commercial Lawyers, Attorneys, Barristers, Solicitors Advocates, Legal Practitioners rendering legal services, Legal Consultants and Notary Public with Law Office in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria