I’m used to asking questions about leasing mineral rights in a number of counties in this forum, but am a little out of my element in helping my wife and her siblings with a purchase offer they’ve received. They own two 13-acre tracts in SE/4 18-6N-5E, including both surface and mineral rights.They’re interested in selling the property, perhaps with or without the mineral rights, and I’m looking for guidance in determining a fair market value. I’m sure the offer they’ve received is low, but don’t know the best ways to get either an informal estimate or an actual appraisal here. Any suggestions would be most welcome.
Rudy
The surface land has one value and the minerals have a separate value. You may want to contact a real estate appraiser about the value of the surface. Do they pay taxes on their surface land? (I don’t own surface land in OK, so don’t know how it is taxed.) The county appraiser would have that value if so. Never totally accurate as to sales, but is a guide. See what land is going for in the local paper.
Minerals are a bit different. You can have them evaluated by a certified petroleum engineer or you might also be able to get some help fro the county clerk for oil and gas in Pottawatamie for how to search for recent sales in your area.
Folks on the forum may have more knowledge of recent sales.
Thanks, Martha. My wife has paid the tax bills for many years, so we have those. However, I assume based on residential property tax assessments that they’re substantially lower than market value. Don’t know by how much in this case, and maybe that is less applicable here.
Actually, I just looked at the tax bills for the two properties, and the assessments are for about 1/30 of the amount offered by the prospective buyer, so I don’t think that’s a good guide.
I didn’t think of checking the local papers, which I might be able to do online. Thanks.
I’ve also never seen an offer for mineral rights that came very close to my estimate of the expected value of the property in question (I manage about 100 such properties), but the adequacy of such offers depends on the situation, and here we have properties that we’re unlikely to do anything with, and that will gradually be distributed among a large number of heirs over time. There is a history of leases here, and even a producing well for a brief interval, but if there’s any real prospect here, it’s probably a more modern fracking play. I have no idea whether such prospects really exist here, or not, though.
Rudy
I took a quick look at that area and not much is going on there right now.