Land Surveying in Brookhaven, GA

Brookhaven Property, DeKalb Records, City Review

Brookhaven is a DeKalb County city of 12.2 square miles of land by the Census Bureau's 2024 gazetteer, incorporated in 2012, and the Fulton County line runs along the west side of it. That line matters more than the city boundary does. Deeds and plats for Brookhaven property are filed in DeKalb, and a parcel on the Atlanta side of the line is filed in a different index by a different clerk.

DeKalb County land records go to the Clerk of Superior Court Real Estate Division, on the ground floor of the DeKalb County Courthouse at 556 North McDonough Street in Decatur, south-southeast of Brookhaven. That office records and indexes deeds, security deed cancellations and assignments, lien filings, UCC filings and plats. Ownership and valuation records are held separately by the DeKalb County Property Appraisal Department at 325 Swanton Way in Decatur, which appraises real property at fair market value as of January 1 each year and assesses it at forty percent of that value. Its property search runs on parcel ID, address or owner name.

The plat route in Brookhaven runs through two governments, in a set order. The city's checklist covers lot splits, reconfigurations, combinations, preliminary plats and address plats, and it states that approvals from the appropriate DeKalb County departments are required before the City of Brookhaven approves the plat. Brookhaven supplies the route sheets and review request letters that carry the drawing to the county. A lot split typically needs DeKalb GIS and Watershed Management approval, a combination plat typically needs DeKalb GIS, and a lot split triggers new address assignments from the county. Anything involving more than two lots becomes a preliminary plat.

The reconfiguration rule is the one that catches owners out. If a plat splits a lot and also revises other existing lines, DeKalb GIS requires the parcels to be combined first and then re-subdivided into the configuration you actually wanted, which turns one drawing into an address plat, a combination plat and a reconfiguration plat. The county also wants the recorded plat sent back afterward so the county map can be updated.

On the ground, Brookhaven is a built-out place where survey questions come from old lines rather than new ones. Nancy Creek runs through the city, along with its north fork, and those carry a state stream buffer. The name itself is a warning about the county line: the Brookhaven Historic District on the National Register, listed January 24, 1986, straddles the Fulton and DeKalb line, so part of it sits in the City of Atlanta and part inside Brookhaven. Lots platted that long ago often do not agree with the fences, drives and walls standing on them now, which is why a teardown or an addition close to a line usually turns into a boundary retracement first.

S&S Land Surveying runs out of 549 West Ave in Cedartown, and William "Bart" Sims, the firm's licensed Georgia land surveyor, signs and seals the plats. Georgia is the only state S&S is licensed in.