Hello! Because this is a modification of a lease from 1908 the old lease most likely has a 1/8 royalty provision (12.5%). Because of a court case (referred to as “Tawney”) and a WV legislature bill (SB 360), these old leases are protected from the oil company taking out ANY production taxes (severence tax) or post-production expenses. If you do negotiate on the terms, ask for 18% Gross Royalty at the wellhead with NO post-production expenses taken out. Do NOT agree to a “marketing enhancement” clause in the lease. Ask them for a “Hold Harmless” clause to be included in the lease and also ask for a “No Warranty of Title” clause. You will have to pay personal property tax on the minerals once they start production of oil & gas. There should be property taxes being paid on the minerals you own in the ground right now. Is someone in your family paying property taxes to Wetzel county? You might be able to negotiate around $400-$500 bonus payment per net acre from Antero for signing the modification. Your net acres are the total acreage multiplied by the % or fraction that you own. (for example 1/5 x 41 AC = 8.2 net acres) Also, from another angle, since this is a modification of an old lease, for the old lease to be still valid and in force, there has to be oil and/or gas being produced from the property. If there has been no production for many years, then the old lease is not still valid. If there is oil & gas being produced, then you should have been receiving royalty payments from that production. That is something you should ask the landsman from Antero: Why is this old lease still valid, and if it is valid, why am I not receiving royalty payments”
That’s what we can’t figure out. We are just now being notified because most of the previous generations are deceased already. But there still is a 50 yr gap from the year my grandfather and father passed and none of us (even them) heard about this land before. So not sure who was collecting royalties all this time, if any?
This would be a good question for Antero. It is also possible, if you haven’t traced this back to the original lease, that your ancestor had sold part of the oil and gas rights and kept the rest, then kept the remaining oil and gas when selling the surface. If that is the case, maybe the heirs or assigns of the other party has been collecting. Do you have a copy of the original lease? Antero should supply that. The more you can find out, the better off you’ll be. And do you have a tax map and parcel number? With that and a little bit of map reading, you can find out about wells on the property or near by.
Can Antero be contacted directly? Because the landman answered 2 emails and none since. We only know the county and the lease book and page number. So we’ll try to find out more info.
Thanks to everyone who answered.
Here http://129.71.118.43/ is a link to the database for Doddridge county. They have a lot of older things in the regular search. If you want to look for something with book and page, and can’t find it in the Index search (the one where you put your search term in) you can use image search and deed book or lease book. If you have trouble, ask and I can help with search tips. About Antero, do a google search for Antero Resources Bridgeport (the Bridgeport WV office is where you can get the best help; they also have property other areas of the country) and see what you find. Explain what you need, including specifically that you are a mineral owner of an old lease and are trying to find information on it, including what the API number is for the well that is holding the lease by production.If you get an API number and want to know what to do with that information, ask here. The state of WV has a database with some good information for each well.
Thank you so much for the information!
WVDEP Oil&Gas Well Information. This site was shared with me in one of my posts. There are more.