Hi everyone, we are in the process of transferring my uncles minerals to my mom, so far we have gotten the affidavit of heirship from several different oil companies, gotten them notarized along with a list of property descriptions, we have sent these off to the county clerks for recording, then we let the oil companies know that this has been recorded. Is there anything else that needs to be done or if anyone has any other information on this process or anything to avoid? Thank you in advance for your help with this. Chris
I may have missed seeing it, but I did not notice which state your uncle resided in as its laws would determine who were your uncle’s heirs if he died without a valid Will. So your uncle’s parents are both dead, he died without a surviving spouse or any descendants? Assuming no Will and your mother is the heir, the companies taking production will need a copy of the recorded affidavit of heirship to prepare new division orders. Did your uncle have any debts was he required to file a federal or state income tax return for the year of death?
One thing I was advised to do is to periodically check your state’s unclaimed property for your uncle. Despite all the new documentation, companies still go by old addresses and information.
Chris: Welcome to the community. You will find a wealth of information.
You did not mention which state had the minerals. I’m assuming that the properties were not in a trust of a Transfer on Death Deed.
In Oklahoma an affidavit of heirship usually won’t do the trick. Most companies will require a probate to recognize your mother’s interest. This is not as bad as it may seem and can usually be handled without the need to travel to Oklahoma or appear in court.
An affidavit of heirship may work in Texas and a few other states.
There is a will and trust, and it names my mother as sole inheritor. The property is in Oaklahoma, Arkansas,Texas and Wyoming, we have talked to Flywheel, XTO, Riverbend, Merit and Kaiser Francis to let them know of his passing, these are the only ones that we are getting checks from at this time. The rest of the properties should just transfer over thru the county clerks? I think. We are also checking back on my grandmother’s properties, some weren’t transferred, and she died in 85. So and tips and tricks for this would be greatly appreciated because i am the next after my mother to inherit and i would like to make it as smooth as possible. Thank you
As a starting point, you need an experienced estate and trust attorney in the state of your uncle’s residence to determine which property had been transferred to trust during your uncle’s life and which property passed under probated will to the trust. Title will need to be cleaned up in grandparents’ estates. This is not a DIY project.
You only need to do a probate in the state or states where the minerals are located. Those states laws of intestate succession determines heir ship, not the state of residence of the decedent.
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Original poster has said uncle had a will and trust so heirship for uncle likely not involved. Need to probate will in state of domicile and then ancillary probate of will in each state where minerals are located if minerals not transferred to trust before death.
Lets back up and take a broader response. The following are what if’s. If the title to all remains in the uncles name, a probate will required in each state plus his state of residence. Upon conclusion of the ancillaiy probates ownership will then vest in the Trust and deeds will then be required to transfer ownership to your Mom.
This process will also require date of death appraisals which will eventually become Moms cost basis. Mom may want to give thought to transferring all, by deed, to a trust to avoid a second probate process at her passing.
Thank you for all of your advice, ill be going over all this with mom tomorrow and looking into a trust and estate attorneys in the states where the properties are located, most of the minerals are in his trust and she is listed as the sole heir so hopefully everything will go smoothly.
From earlier comments. Definitely go to Claim It property in each state. My mom forgot to put one of her oil properties into her trust so the oil company in Texas sent it to the state. It ended up in Claim It Texas. It took us over a year to get our money back. It was over $5000 so the Claim It Texas people told us that was the why it took so long.
We have been doing that with my grandparents names, so far i think we have recovered 45 thousand, so we will keep doing that.
I had one lease that went to unclaimed property in Oklahoma. My mom had a trust in Ks.lawyer lost the trust . This was 25 years after my mom died.I didn’t have a copy so they wanted us to make a new trust with an Oklahoma lawyer. I’m in Missouri.he wasn’t much help said he would do it and never got back to me.ended up getting half of the money and gave up on the other half.
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