What surveys catch
The classics: fences meaningfully off-line (in either direction), neighbor improvements encroaching (or yours encroaching outward), access drives crossing corners of other ownership, and acreage differing from marketing. Each is better discovered as a negotiating fact than inherited as a surprise.
Surveys also anchor everything else on bare land — septic areas, setbacks, and building envelopes all measure from lines someone must locate correctly.
When to commission one
Strong cases: bare land purchases, boundary-dependent value (that meadow, that river bend), visible ambiguity or neighbor structures near lines, and any planned building near setbacks. Existing recent surveys transfer usefully — ask sellers first.
Title insurance and surveys answer different questions; title confirms ownership rights while surveys locate them on dirt. Big rural purchases often deserve both answers.
Local rule of thumb: Where the money depends on where the line is, pay the surveyor before you pay the seller.