I bought some land in Reeves county a few years ago and trying to figure out if I own the minerals or not? How can I determine this?
You’ll have to run title from sovereignty, which is when the State originally sold the land. You can hire a landman to do this or do it yourself. There are a lot of threads on here that discuss how to do that. You should search through those to get a basic understanding. Also, a google search would probably help too. Good luck.
To be 100% certain what ABond says about tracing the deed records from the original land grants is true. But if your acquisition deed didn’t include a mineral reservation, or make reference to any prior reservations, work backward in the deed records and if your chain of title doesn’t include any mineral reservation during the past 100 years there should be a high probability you own the minerals.
You can start your search using a site like www.texasfile.com. Using their indexes is free, you just need to set up an account, and if you find documents you want to look at you can view them on line for $2.00. That won’t take you back as far as you need to go but might go far enough to answer your question without requiring a trip to the courthouse in Pecos.
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It is fairly simple,
Check your Deed for the Land! It will stipulate whether it's only surface, or surface and water, or surface, water, and minerals. That is what deeds are for! If you have mineral rights, you may have to do some research to find out "what" mineral rights you have . . . . . some formations, if not all, may not be transferred to you in the deed.
My best regards,
Stephen Watkins
I wish it were that simple. Unfortunately this is not stated in the deed. I see a lot of deeds and rarely do I see this stipulated or detailed…If it were that easy we probably wouldn’t have to do a lot of research or perhaps have landmen (women).
In my limited experience, courthousedirect.com has a more comprehensive database. Be sure to check wills as well as deeds. This can be an arduous process.
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How old is the Deed. The one we have that is producing does not specify anything either.
We also have shares in a property that was homesteaded by my Great Grandmother, 640 acres in New Mexico. That was probably in the very early 1900s’ or late 1800’s. That side of my family has produced a lot of children over the generations so our share of the mineral rights for that property has been splintered quite a bit. The property has been producing since the mid sixties.
Stephen Watkins
The deed I have is 2-3 years old…I’ll start with TexasFile…I’ve used it before and see where we go.