Our family owns 1/2 ownership of 80Acs of O&G rights. Other family has leased their 1/2, we have not. (no surface just rights)
Initially we were offered same lease terms as other family. We signed, then our lease was "voided" by gasco. Other family's lease approved. 6 mos. Later gasco came back to us with new offer that was much lower in bonus and % than original lease. Our family rejected it asking for same lease terms as other family.
No further response from gasco.
Question: Can gasco drill, pull gas from unit without lease on our 40acs?
Max
What state might your minerals be located?
Buddy Cotten
It seems like there is something in the fact situation that I am missing here. For example, I do not know what "voided" means, unless it means they reneged on their agreement with you. If enough money were at stake, it might be worthwhile to pursue a civil case. That does take some brass for "Gasco" to offer different terms to two sets of owners concerning the exact same tract of land, although I could see a few scenarios in which it would make sense. For example, if the price of the commodity for which they were exploring dropped significantly, that could result in lower offers. Also, there were several times when my client dropped offers or withdrew from contract negotiations altogether after getting the results of drilling operations nearby. In other words, if they drilled a dry hole nearby, the value of your minerals just went down.
Pete
Thanks for the response; Our family signed off on the proposed lease April of 2012. Sent it back to gasco, and in about 2 months it was returned un-signed by gasco and stamped “void”. Called gasco and asked why our lease was voided and other family’s lease approved and bonus paid. Reason given…drop in gas prices and inventory levels. Note: we are talking about mineral rights only…no surface. In a year gasco came back to us with a significantly lower offer on our 1/2, which we rejected, and stated that we would accept what was offered to us originally, and what was given to other family.
Can gasco include entire 80acs in a unit, permit and drill without a lease on 1/2 of the 80acs? Or would they need to " go around" entire 80acs. If this is the case… They will be out $100,00.00+ in bonus money already paid to other family.
Max
Depends on your state's regulations. In Texas, bottom line, yes, they could drill with only 1/2 of the 80 acres leased. It probably would not make good financial sense for them to do so because then they would have to treat the unleased mineral owners as working-interest owners, meaning the Gasco would lose some profits, assuming the well IS profitable. If they have $100,000 in bonus money already paid out, they might go ahead and do include the 80 acres. If they have $10,000 in bonus money already paid out, they probably would cut the 80 acres out of the pooling unit unless they really needed it for some reason.