Blog · September 30, 2026
What More or Less Means in a Deed
More or less tells you the area or the distance is an estimate beside a stronger description. It is not a license to move a line until the acres come out even. Monuments and the plat still control when the law’s order of calls says they do.
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A phrase of caution, not a slider
Captions say containing 12.5 acres, more or less, or 200 feet, more or less, to the creek. The phrase warns that the number is not the heart of the grant. The heart may be the monuments, the adjoiner, the lot on the plat, or the aliquot. A small shortage or surplus does not rewrite the deed. A huge difference can be evidence of a mistake in the number, which a surveyor and a title attorney can pursue. What you cannot do is treat more or less as permission to expand the parcel to a round acreage you like, or to shrink a neighbor until your GIS acreage matches the deed. The words cut both ways. They soften the number. They do not delete the boundaries.
Distance versus area
More or less on a distance, especially a distance that runs to a monument or a road, often means the monument wins and the number is approximate. More or less on acreage often means the computed area is secondary to the lines. Those are applications of the priority of calls, which ranks intent, monuments, courses, and area in a familiar order, subject to the facts and the jurisdiction. You are not applying that doctrine by eyeballing a tax map. You are noticing which part of the sentence the scrivener flagged as approximate. If every course is more or less and no monument is named, the phrase is doing less work, and the deed may simply be loose. That is a reason for a survey, not a reason to average the lines with a laser measure.
Tax acres beside the phrase
Assessors print an acreage from a polygon. It will rarely match the deed to the hundredth. More or less explains small gaps without a conspiracy. It does not explain a deed of 40 acres mapped as 12, which may be a split, an exception, or a mapping error. Read the whole caption for less and except and for a lot number. County GIS is an assessment map, not a survey, and not a recorded plat. Platbookmapper links to it so you can find the account. It does not adjudicate more or less. A measuring wheel around a field is not a survey of the acreage either. If the number matters for price or for a boundary, get a survey and read the deed against the monuments.
What to do next
- Underline more or less and see whether it modifies area or a distance.
- Find the monuments or the plat the number is attached to.
- Do not adjust a line to force round acres.
- Treat a huge mismatch as a document problem to investigate, not as free land.
The mix-up to avoid
Reading more or less as a percentage you can add to the lot. The phrase does not grant a bonus strip. It says the stated number is not exact.
Questions people ask
Is there a fixed percent that more or less allows?
No universal percent. Some old cases discuss whether a shortage is small enough to ignore or large enough to suggest a mistake. The percent is not a DIY allowance you measure off a fence with a phone.
If the plat says 0.28 acres more or less, which do I use?
Use the lot as the plat draws it, with its monuments and dimensions. The acreage is the computed result, flagged as approximate. A later survey may recompute the area without moving the lot lines.
Find the county map
Search the county on the Platbookmapper home page. The directory links to the official parcel viewer. It does not draw the lots, and the line on the screen is an assessment map, not a survey.
Not a survey. County GIS and tax parcel maps are assessment and planning layers. They are not a substitute for a recorded plat, deed, or licensed survey.