Hello all,
I am trying to find some information on a lease in southern Jefferson County, OK. My father inherited a small share (.02) of a lease from his mother. It's at S19-6S-5W and comprises parts of lot #3. The only information I have comes from a Division Order dated in 1951.
I believe a well there was producing from the 50's up until sometime in the late 60s or 70s. A land company contacted my father in 2005 and contracted a 3 year lease but nothing apparently came of it.
My father is now in nursing care here in Colorado and I'm trying to determine if this lease is still producing or not. So my many questions are: how do I find out if there is any production going on? How would I determine the market value (assuming such a thing is possible)? How would I go about selling the interest? Does anyone have a recommendation of someone who might help with all this?
My father does have the parcel registered with the Oklahoma Mineral Owner Registry. I have submitted questions to their help desk, but despite their claim of one day turn around, I've yet to receive any answers.
I've also asked for help in Jefferson County group here on this site. There doesn't seem to be much activity there so I'm asking for help from a wider audience.
I apologize if I don't have all the terminology down or things are not clear. This whole thing is rather new (and frustrating) for me.
Thanks in advance.
Mark Palmer
Greenwood Village, CO
Mark,
No current well now there that I can see. Has been drilled before, but no current production. The Division Order should have a "decimal interest" somewhere on it showing the percentage of the unit your grandmother owned mineral rights in. Usually is an 8-digit number such as .00345678 etc. You can use this to figure the amount of acres in the unit she was being paid on (the Division Order means that she was being paid royalties from this section at some point, and the decimal given on the DO is "code" for how many acres she owned in the spacing unit where the well was drilled.)
It's common for a company to lease your minerals and then never get around to drilling a well before the lease expires. Often owners can lease their mineral rights several times (and receive several bonus checks) before a well is ever drilled.
There are plenty of places online to sell your mineral rights if you decided to sell these, including my website. Simply doing a Google search for "sell mineral rights" or similar will bring up plenty of potential buyers. Just be careful when dealing with people you don't know, especially since it appears you have little idea what these may be worth. You don't want to sell to an unscrupulous buyer who might "lowball" you on the price. Most are honest, but not all, and of course all are business people and so will try to get them for as little as they can while still being (hopefully) fair to you. Try to get some help learning what these may be worth before you go talking to buyers.
There is not much going on in this immediate area so I doubt these will be worth much were you to sell them. Probably a few hundred bucks an acre at most would be my guess. No harm in asking for "offers" from potential buyers once you've done a little research though, since other people's opinions on value may differ from mine.
You can keep an eye on activity all over Oklahoma (drilling permits, production, well completions etc.) by visiting the Oklahoma Corporation Commission website. They are the regulatory body for oil and gas in Oklahoma and they have lots of information available to the public on their website free of charge.
Hope this helps you out.
Frederick M. "Mick" Scott CMM, RPL
The Mineral Hub
Mick,
Wow! Thanks very much. Your reply cleared up a lot of questions and issues. The share was .02084 on 11.3100 net mineral acres (as I understand it). I'll check out the OCC website. I had looked at it before but wasn't sure what I was looking for.
Thanks very much!
Mark