Real Estate Representative/Paralegal

Primary Job Duties & Responsibilities

• Investigate, negotiate, acquire, defend, and ensure legal recording and enforcement of property rights required for electric, gas, or communication infrastructure
• Utilize existing and future software and physical files to document all communication with landowners including in-person meetings, email, and phone in addition to capturing project updates and progress on each affected parcel
• Engages landowners to mitigate encroachments on rights of way
• Prepare or assist in preparing and securing specific state, highway, railroad, County, Town, City, Village permits for use of lands owned by governmental agencies, the public or other utilities including tree-clearing permits
• Investigate, negotiate, and acquire leases, licenses, and permits for Networks infrastructure, staging areas for storm or construction lay down areas, railroads & canals crossing permits
• Coverage of document management involving legal documents filing, recording, parceling & indexing and retrieval
• Coordinate and process payments to landowners for certain property rights through internal workflow
• Reviews and processes executed documents according to client requirements; may include requesting payment remittance, recording, etc.
• Serves as legal witness as necessary for condemnation or other proceedings

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities

• Knowledge of real estate principles gained through education and experience
• Must have NY Notary Public License or have the ability to obtain that license within 3 months of hiring
• Working knowledge of drafting and negotiating property rights documents including rights-of-way, easements, leases, purchases, and sale agreements
• Strong understanding of electric transmission, sub-transmission, and distribution principles as related to right-of-way and land rights
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Strong negotiation and interpersonal skills
• Ability to utilize multiple forms of technology including project databases, Microsoft Office Suite, Google Earth, etc.
• Ability to plot metes and bounds descriptions of property and read a variety of maps, electronic and paper
• Ability to evaluate, interpret, and analyze engineering and right-of-way drawings
• Ability to interpret and research (abstract) legal documents
• Skilled in property rights research methods, including courthouse searches for recorded documents and internet research of same
• Ability to determine valuation of crops, timber, etc. for damage settlement
• Ability to travel regularly