DON'T CHOOSE APEX UNLESS YOU WANT TO BE BILLED FOR WORK THAT HAD NOT BEEN DONE.
I choose Apex based on its reviews but was horribly disappointed in the service, professionalism, and most especially receiving an invoice for work that had not been done. After calling and receiving no response from the company, I had to find out from another surveyor about issues relating to the survey. When Apex survey did finally call me (several weeks later and after the closing), it was just about the invoice. When I spoke about my concerns, the owner? (Hagen) did nothing to address my concerns except offer excuses and talk about how good the ratings of his company are. He was extremely unprofessional and did nothing to address my issues. Details to follow:
I was closing on a house and decided to choose Apex for the survey work rather than the survey company suggested by the title company (big mistake). When I called to arrange the survey and staking, I was given a date as to when this work was to be done. After about a week passed AFTER when the work was supposed to be done, I called Apex to find out why I had not received the survey and why the staking had not been done. I was told that they could not find the poles/metal needed on the corners to complete the survey. They said that would go out in a few days and "try" again. I called the realtor selling the house because the closing was now quickly approaching. The realtor called the survey company, which finally came out. The realtor apparently had to show the survey people how to do their job as the poles/metal were there the whole time despite what I had been told. (Keep in mind that the survey company did not call me to say that they could not complete the survey. I had to call them many days after the work was to be done.)
The survey company finally found the poles that were there the whole time. I received a plat together with an invoice for the survey and a separate charge for "staked property lines." I was just about to pay the invoice when I decided to go over and look at the stakes. The reason I wanted to see the stakes first was because the survey appeared to show that my soon-to-be-fence was on the neighbor's property. Yet the survey stated that "all fences frame." (as a non-surveyor, I understood all fences frame to mean that the fences are in the property.) I arrive at the house and the stakes had not been put up. To repeat, I was invoiced for stakes when the staking had not been done. I called the survey company to find out about what I thought were discrepancies on the report and about the stakes. No response at all.
The realtor was finally able to get in touch with Apex and was told that someone would eventually be out to do the staking (for which I had already been invoiced). Just days before the closing, the staking was finally done. In the meantime, I had to find out from another surveyor that the fence was in part on the neighbor's property. Not only did the survey company not respond to me, they never called me to tell me that there was an encroachment. I guess I was supposed to become an expert on reading surveys to figure that out for myself.
Luckily, I was able to resolve the issue with a last minute negotiation and easement for the fence. No thanks at all to Apex.
As a final insult, I was told when the invoice was sent (for work that had not been done) that I would receive "several copies" of the plat in the mail. I did not receive those. read more