Nor Sor Sam Land Measurement Technique

[KP1]

When "buying" (I don't want to go in to the correctness of the term "buying") land under Nor Sor Sam title deeds, can anyone tell me the correct procedure carried out to measure the land - i.e. agree on the measured m² on the plot.

If the land is flat and square Its an easy job. If the boudaries are say Star shaped, for example, and part of it is on a 30° slope, then its not at all straight forward.

I'd appreciate comment from anyone who has gone through this process as I envisage unless you are very careful you could end up paying for more land than you actually get.

Is there a standard process? Thanks in advance.

[chownah]

Measurement of land is done as if you were looking directly down on the parcel....slopes do not affect the measurement. I have never dealt with nor sor sam land but if you are asking how do the gov't surveyors calculate the area of a parcel of land after they have surveyed it...then the answer is that at least where I live (northern Thailand) the surveyors from the land office have hand held computers which will do the job and also computers in the office that will do it as well.

If you have a computer with a cad program (AutoCAd, Microsoft, etc.) then you can do it too by laying out points using the coordinates from the survey, then connect the points with lines, and then ask the software the area enclosed by the lines. Of course this assumes that coordinates are available and I don't know about nor sor sam...chanoted land around here has a data sheet available at the land office which lists the coordinates...but they are in an unusual format so you have to do some conversion of units......the easiest way is to get the surveyors to do it for you!!

[KP1]

Thanks for that. I guess in that case its down to the buyers to get an independant survey done rather than rely on the sellers/estate agents. The land is on a sub divided plot on Koh Phangan and is not marked out but rather measured out after you state the m sq that you want to "buy". So you can inderstand my concern that the measurement is verified.

[chownah]

The two times that we bought land we paid the gov't about 3,000 baht for the survey and re-setting of lost markers.....so my guess is that you could find some surveyor to do your work for around 3,000 baht (ballpark estimate)...which is not so expensive really. You might go to the land office that has jurisdiction where you intend to 'buy' and see if they'll do it for you. Check this out soon because sometimes the surveyors are booked up for quite a while.....if this is the case then I'd recommend talking to the actual surveyor and ask if they are in your neighborhood doing other surveys could they unofficially mark the boundaries for you and then come back later and do the official survey...this is what we did and we got the unofficial survey in less than a month when the official survey was 4 months later................also if you go to the land office and talk to the surveyors directly maybe they could do some extra off hours work for you for a fee...(wink wink).

Of course it might be even cheaper to just hire a private surveyor...I've never done that so I don't know what the price would be.

Edited December 17, 2005 by chownah

[stevehaigh]

Measurement of land is done as if you were looking directly down on the parcel....slopes do not affect the measurement. 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

i believe that is the case for chanoht, not nor sor 3. NS3 is done the old fasioned way with tape measure and theodolite (sp?).

so for NS3, the slope will not affect the land size but for chanote, on a steep slope you will get more actual surface area of land than on the flat, using the the chanoht (looking directly down on the parcel) method.

please correct me if i am wrong about this.

[monty]

I have had several plots with a chanoot verified by the land and house department (2500 Baht fee).

Sometimes they used theodolite and tape-measure, other times they confirmed with GPS.

You better do this when buying land, since the marker poles very often get lost, or moved just a little

No experience with NS3.

I wouldn't thouch unconfirmed NS3 anyway, only the confirmed NS3 (Nor Sor Saam Gor) where all requirements to issue a full chanoot are fullfilled and verified.

[chownah]

Measurement of land is done as if you were looking directly down on the parcel....slopes do not affect the measurement. 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

i believe that is the case for chanoht, not nor sor 3. NS3 is done the old fasioned way with tape measure and theodolite (sp?).

so for NS3, the slope will not affect the land size but for chanote, on a steep slope you will get more actual surface area of land than on the flat, using the the chanoht (looking directly down on the parcel) method.

please correct me if i am wrong about this.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

When surveying properly with a theodolite and chain (a surveyor's steel tape is called a 'chain'...at least in the US) the end result will be coordinates based on pure horizontal measurements. The area calculated from these coordinates will be the same as the area looking from directly overhead....this is the way all land surveying is done if done properly.

For example, if you bought one square meter of land it might measure 1 metre on each side measured horizontally.....even if the land was on a 45 degree slope you would not measure along the slope.....you would measure horizontally. By measuring horizontally what I mean is that if the land is so steep that you can not hold the chain horizontally then you measure on a slope and then convert the final result to the equivalent horizontal measurement....so I guess it is more accurate to say that the coordinates used to define the parcel will be the horizontal distances regardless of whether the measurement taken are taken on a slope or not. The same coordinates will be calculated for a parcel regardless of the type of equipment used....except of course for how accurately the measurements can be taken.

[Dragonman]

Measurement of land is done as if you were looking directly down on the parcel....slopes do not affect the measurement. 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

i believe that is the case for chanoht, not nor sor 3. NS3 is done the old fasioned way with tape measure and theodolite (sp?).

so for NS3, the slope will not affect the land size but for chanote, on a steep slope you will get more actual surface area of land than on the flat, using the the chanoht (looking directly down on the parcel) method.

please correct me if i am wrong about this.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

When surveying properly with a theodolite and chain (a surveyor's steel tape is called a 'chain'...at least in the US) the end result will be coordinates based on pure horizontal measurements. The area calculated from these coordinates will be the same as the area looking from directly overhead....this is the way all land surveying is done if done properly.

For example, if you bought one square meter of land it might measure 1 metre on each side measured horizontally.....even if the land was on a 45 degree slope you would not measure along the slope.....you would measure horizontally. By measuring horizontally what I mean is that if the land is so steep that you can not hold the chain horizontally then you measure on a slope and then convert the final result to the equivalent horizontal measurement....so I guess it is more accurate to say that the coordinates used to define the parcel will be the horizontal distances regardless of whether the measurement taken are taken on a slope or not. The same coordinates will be calculated for a parcel regardless of the type of equipment used....except of course for how accurately the measurements can be taken.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yes, this is the correct method based on Property Law which accepts that "land" does not mean the earth, but also the ground below and the air above. So all plots should be based on a horizontal measurement.

[chownah]

Just to give some perspective to the difference between measuring on a slope and measuring on the horizontal...if you are measuring a horizontal distance of 100 metres and the land slopes so that it drops 10 metres in that 100 metre distance then the slope distance will be 100.50 metres...a half meter discrepency. If the drop is 5 metres in 100 metres then the slope distance is 100.12 metres...a 12 centimetre discrepency.....a 2 metre drop will have a 2 centimetre discrepency.

[stevehaigh]

Just to give some perspective to the difference between measuring on a slope and measuring on the horizontal...if you are measuring a horizontal distance of 100 metres and the land slopes so that it drops 10 metres in that 100 metre distance then the slope distance will be 100.50 metres...a half meter discrepency.  If the drop is 5 metres in 100 metres then the slope distance is 100.12 metres...a 12 centimetre discrepency.....a 2 metre drop will have a 2 centimetre discrepency.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Pythagoras strikes again: For a right triangle with legs a and b and hypotenuse c, c = sqrt( a*a + b*b )

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/PythagoreanTheorem.html

i did a bit more checking and i have it from pretty realiable sources that chanoht and Nor Sor 3 Ghaw use the view from above method as you state but the old Nor Sor 3 uses surface area. so Nor Sor 3 land on a slope will get smaller if retitled to a higher title.

Edited December 20, 2005 by stevehaigh

[Rinrada]

Have a chat with the surveyors and they might puts the pegs of your new bit of land a wee bit further out than they could be....magnetic variations.(as long as nobody owns next door).....

[stevehaigh]

Have a chat with the surveyors and they might puts the pegs of your new bit of land a wee bit further out than they could be....magnetic variations.(as long as nobody owns next door)..... 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

usually someone does own next door and they will have been notified of the survey. if they are smart, they should witness the survey to make sure that doesn't happen.

[Rinrada]

The mountain next to me is G owned and you would have to be Edmond Hillary to climb up it.

[stevehaigh]

The mountain next to me is G owned and you would have to be Edmond Hillary to climb up it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

that sounds cool, i would love a bit of rock climbing on my door step. where are you?

[Rinrada]

Mae On

[chownah]

Have a chat with the surveyors and they might puts the pegs of your new bit of land a wee bit further out than they could be....magnetic variations.(as long as nobody owns next door)..... 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

usually someone does own next door and they will have been notified of the survey. if they are smart, they should witness the survey to make sure that doesn't happen.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

My experience has been that before checking the existing monuments and setting new monuments (monuments are the little concrete posts they set for the corners...in Thai they are called Lah Khet) the gov't surveyors are required to give notice to all the adjoining property owners that this is being done....I guess so that they can give their input....I'm pretty sure that it is a legal requirement and I believe (but I'm not sure) that the adjoining property owners must be notified a certain number of days in advance of the survey and that's one reason why it take so long to get your survey done.

As for the older low grade land titles are concerned, these tracts of land were considered of little value when they were originally surveyed and the surveyors probably did not take the time to do really accurate work because frankly no one cared.....this is my opinion based on having dealt with many old surveys of undeveloped forest land in the US surveyed 60 or more years ago.....and based on how loose the Thai surveyors I have watched are even in surveying land with chanote.