As a long time mineral owner that manages minerals for my family I appreciate any good resource for reliable information and this website is a great resource that I value highly.
Another resource that has been helpful to my family has been our family membership in the Natl Assocation of Royalty Owners. The annual conventions provide a good place for our family to come together under the scope of educating ourselves about this wonderful asset we all are blessed to share in. Any situation we have someone else has been through it before and they dont mind sharing their experiences.
Our family's experience is probably similar to many royalty owners at some point in the cycle. The first generation of royalty owner started with the ancestor's ranch, which was then passed to succeeding heirs but usualy separated from the surface interests. So there is potential problem number 1. But since everyone in that generation still knows each other things usually work out pretty well. Now comes the next generation of exponentially larger group of cousins. This group has never set foot on the old ranch and doesnt know the country cousins. And by now the production has long leveled out and the divyed up check is even smaller and hardly worth hiring a lawyer to handle, but if we can get all the cousins to chip in then collectively it works. Forming a family partnership of some legal sort with a designated representative is crucial to maximizing the income and prudent management. One of the most important things I can pass along I think is getting the family to put aside some significant cash early on to save for a war chest when it comes time to force an operator to do what is right. Seeking justice in court is a very expensive propistion and to be avoided at almost any cost, but at some point right is right and if you have paid attention to the expert advice elsewhere on this website you have a strong lease form to prove it. BUt the question becomes will you have the money to make it stick? You better, or tuck tail and take your lease form to the house.
This year's 2013 Texas convention will be held in Austin at Barton Creek Resort and Spa, Wed July 17- Friday the 19th. The hotel room block will sell out fast so I highly recommend making your reservations early to get the $129 per night rate. http://www.naro-us.org/Texas
(I should have mentioned in my earlier posting about the TCU royalty classes that the tuition includes a paid 1 year membership in NARO.)
Cheers!
Ed