4.5 Chain of Title, Senior Rights, and Record Conflicts

Tracing the Chain of Title

A chain of title is the unbroken, time-ordered sequence of conveyances and other instruments through which ownership of a parcel passes. For a surveyor, the chain is not about marketability; it is about discovering how each boundary was created and in what order. Tracing the chain backward usually leads to the parent tract and the first deed or plat that split the subject parcel off from it. That creating instrument is often the most important document in the survey, because it fixes the original geometry and the order of severance.

The practical steps:

1. Start with the current deed and identify the grantor.
2. Follow that grantor back to when they were a grantee.
3. Repeat until you reach the parent tract or a satisfactory root of title.
4. Note the sequence and dates of conveyances out of the parent tract—this sequence drives senior rights.

The order of conveyances matters as much as the descriptions themselves, because a later deed cannot legally convey land the grantor had already conveyed to someone else.

Senior and Junior Rights

When one owner conveys pieces of a larger tract at different times, the doctrine of senior rights governs conflicts among them. The rule: the earlier (senior) grant is satisfied first and in full, and each later (junior) grantee takes only what remains. A grantor cannot convey to a junior buyer land already deeded to a senior buyer.

The consequence for measurement is critical: the senior parcel receives its full called dimensions, and any shortage or excess discovered in the parent tract is absorbed by the junior (last-conveyed) parcel.

Worked example: a 300-ft tract is sold as three 100-ft lots, deeded in order A, then B, then C. A resurvey finds only 297 ft. Lots A and B keep their full 100 ft each; Lot C absorbs the 3-ft shortage and is 97 ft. Senior rights make the deficiency fall on the last grantee, not split it evenly.

Overlaps, Gaps, Remainders, and Color of Title

Record conflicts commonly take three forms:

• Overlap — two deeds describe the same ground; senior rights or intent resolves which controls.
• Gap (hiatus) — a strip falls outside both adjoining descriptions, owned by neither as described; this often signals a measurement or sequencing error needing adjoiner research.
• Ambiguous remainder — a deed conveys "the remainder" after prior exceptions; the surveyor must locate every senior exception to define what is left.

When a current deed contains an exception ("less and except the 30-ft road strip previously conveyed"), the surveyor must recognize that the excepted land was already severed and is not part of the present conveyance.

Color of title is a written instrument—a deed, decree, or contract—that appears on its face to convey title but is legally defective (e.g., a bad description, a forged signature, or a grantor without title). It does not by itself transfer good title, yet it is significant: possession under color of title can extend a claimant's rights to the entire area described in the defective instrument (constructive possession), rather than only the part physically occupied. This bridges into adverse possession, discussed next.

Working Through Sequential Conveyances

Applying senior rights well requires reconstructing the order of severance from the parent tract, which is exactly why the chain of title is traced by date as well as by description. Consider a 10-acre parent tract conveyed in stages: the owner first deeds out a 3-acre piece (senior), later a 4-acre piece (junior to the first), and finally retains or conveys the remainder. Each grant is interpreted against what was already gone. A junior deed that appears to describe land overlapping a senior grant cannot actually convey that overlap—the grantor no longer owned it—so the junior parcel is cut back to the remainder.

A short procedure for record-conflict problems:

1. Establish the date order of all conveyances out of the parent tract.
2. Plot each description and look for overlaps and gaps.
3. Apply senior rights: give each senior parcel its full called dimensions.
4. Assign any shortage or surplus to the junior (last-conveyed) parcel.
5. Account for every exception and reservation before defining a remainder.

Why the creating instrument controls

The deed or plat that created the parcel is privileged because it captures the original intent and geometry before any later transcription errors crept in. Subsequent deeds often copy forward the original description, so an error introduced in a later deed should not override the creating instrument. When a current description conflicts with the creating document, the surveyor weighs which better expresses the original intent, generally favoring the creating instrument and the monuments it called for.

This is the record-side complement to following the original surveyor's footsteps in the field: on paper, you follow the original conveyance; on the ground, you follow the original monuments. Together they keep retracement anchored to how the boundary was actually established rather than to the latest, possibly garbled, copy.