Surveying

I will divide my discussion into two parts. Part I is about aspects of residential land surveying you may find of interest and Part II is about our firm.

I. Surveying The Residential Property (to follow)

II. Sam O. Hirota, Inc. (SOH).
Sam O. Hirota, Inc. was established in 1963 as a Honolulu based consulting firm. Since that time, the firm has worked on a wide range of engineering, planning, surveying and mapping projects throughout Hawaii, the Trust Territories and the South Pacific, serving Federal, State and local governments, and the private sector.

The firm specializes in commercial, resort, hydraulic, hydrology, sanitary, oceanographic, geographic information, land surveying, and mapping projects. We go anywhere surveying takes us, and perhaps a little beyond. Specific capabilities include the use of computers in systems design and the production of large size color maps and drawings. Surveying services we provide range from property boundary surveys & maps for residential lots (our interest here), to surveying hundreds of acres on Oahu & Kauai, to surveying miles of shoreline on all islands. In the area of mapping, the list of projects includes Honolulu International Airport from Hickam Air Force Base to Sand Island, and others on Maui and the Big Island.

The firm has used computers in the automation of civil engineering and land surveying since 1971. It has a staff with more than 15 years of experience using networked multi-user computer systems. Field surveying and engineering information is electronically gathered by digital "theolodites"--the modern version of the surveying instrument you are accustomed to seeing. The data are then transferred directly into the computer system from electronic data collectors for further plotting and information storage.

Indeed, one trend we have seen in surveys in recent years is more presumed "encroachments" of one property, e.g. a wall reputed to belong to it, onto another property. Often, the encroachment is real, and was discovered at the transfer of the home to a new buyer. As Mr. Patton will tell you, sometimes small encroachments matter only to a lender. Small encroachments are commonly found in the surveys of residential property on Oahu.