Question #1
My grandma willed the farm under joint tenancy. After her passing, a few years later my dad and his siblings sold the farm and shared equally in the proceeds and mineral rights. This all took place in North Dakota. They all recorded their mineral right deeds at the same time at the county involved in 1985. I have since claimed my mineral rights under probate from my father's will. Here's the deal. My cousin claims that she is entitled to all the mineral rights as her mother was the last child alive under the joint tenancy. Any truth to her claims?
Question #2
Since this area involved is not totally proven yet, it seems like the leasing companies are not willing to spend the money to do a complete title search. Our property has several owners but to the large family. At what point will they get serious and do necessary research to lease this ground properly? I suspect only after results are in on a couple of wells near the property. Am I right?
Dear Mr. Chase,
Q1.
Let's use names. Gandmom, Dad, Bill and Mary.
Grandmom leaves the property to Dad, Bill and Mary, in equal shares as joint tenants with the full rights of survivorship.
Dad, Bill and Mary sell the property to Sam, reserving all the minerals.
Dad, Bill and finally Mary are now deceased. Your first cousin, the heir of Mary claims all the minerals because Mary was the last to die.
She may be right. It would like to see the language in the transfer from Dad, Bill and Mary to Sam.
I would love an expert in JT states to weigh in with an opinion.
Norris,
Mr. Cotten and your cousin are correct about the Joint tenancy and last survivor if such joint tenancy still existed but there is one thing you stated that maybe the key to the whole thing, you stated they all recorded their mineral deeds, there should be no mineral deeds needing filed unless perhaps they were conveying, quit claiming or basically dissolving their joint tenancy with each other. You need to get a copy of those deeds to know what it was they were doing in those deeds. Also, you should get a copy of the deed when they sold the surface to make certain they retained or reserved all of the minerals.
Mineral Jo, thanks for the reply. Just a couple of quick things and hopefully you can help. The warranty deed joint tenancy dated Sept 1963 from my grandma to her children makes no mention of mineral rights. It only contains surface descriptions. My dad and his siblings sold the property in two stages. The first part was sold with the mineral rights but then subsquently the new owner deeded the mineral rights back to my dad and siblings under a quit claim as joint tenants. A few years later they each filed Statement of claim of mineral right interest on this property.
The second part of the property was sold without the mineral rights under warranty deed under each sibling's name and the grantor reserved all right, title and interest in mineral rights with out no mention of joint tenancy.
Also, I paid a lawyer several hundred dollars to file probate on my dad's mineral rights. I assume he did all the necessary title work to verify that I had a claim. Otherwise, I paid him for nothing. Could this be possible. Thanks for your good help. Looking forward to your answer.
Mr. Chase,
Your subsequent postings added a lot of information. Unless the language of the mineral deed conveying the minerals back into the kids did something flakey, then the language stands on its own, JT with rights of survivorship with the cousin being the winner.
Any more deeds or information that you want to tell us about?
Thanks Buddy and Joe , Did the lawyer I paid several hundred dollars to in 2007 just waste my time and effort but he filed at the courthouse on my behalf a “Personal Representative Deed of Distribution”. Could he have been that far off? Thanks, Norris
You need someone to advise you, who has the documents in front of him. Roughly, 1 word more or less in paragraph 1 can change the whole meaning of paragraph 2. Nobody can advise you on snippets.
Here here I agree but it seems like I’ve heard that before for some reason, anyway. Wow, seems like the whole forum is made up of just snippets and advice on such now what does one do. Hey perhaps you should add a disclaimer to all your comments.
I don’t think I need a disclaimer for pointing out that someone needs professional legal help and they need to have all their documents with them.
Hey perhaps everyone should add a disclaimer to all their comments. A different play of words with the same meaning and it was just a joke.
Everyone here needs professional help, I certainly could or can. Some things are obvious, to some.
Dear MJ,
All of my wives (ex and current) said I need professional help. Is that what you mean?
And yes, I do have an acute sense of the obvious.
Mineral Joe said:
Hey perhaps everyone should add a disclaimer to all their comments. A different play of words with the same meaning and it was just a joke.
Everyone here needs professional help, I certainly could or can. Some things are obvious, to some.
I am an heir to the last survivor of a joint tenancy - warranty deed legally recorded with all rights to minerals only no land. It appears that right of survivorship is spelled out plainly. However, it leaves vague interpretations when I try to understand what happens when the other 2 siblings have passed their mineral intersests down to their heirs when they had no interest to legally convey, eventhough my grandmother survived the other two joint tenants.
What options are there for the heirs of the last surviving joint tenant when the others have handed their mineral rights down to their families. Quiet Title Action is one, any other ideas would be appreciated.