No mineral rights in WV?????? HUH?

Junkman · Jan 30, 2005

I live in the Eastern part of the country..... the Northeast to be more specific.... to be direct to the point, in CT. I know that there are no mineral rights that have been sold on this property since I researched the title back to the 1700's. I was wondering what the consensus of the people think of my retaining the mineral rights when I sell the property at some time in the future. I doubt that there is anything of value here now, but who knows what the future might bring.... Junk...

wvcowgurlz · Nov 19, 2009

Sam B if you can help me locate any public database to show who owns mineral right in WV - Monongalia county I would be very thankful! I have had the run around every where!

dex3361 · Nov 19, 2009

Go to your county tax office and they can tell you who pays the taxes on it. Thats what I did.

Pops15 · Nov 19, 2009

When I was looking to buy some land in southern Illinois I was surprised to find out very few land owners in southern IL own the mineral rights.
The title search on our property didn't show that the mineral rights were reserved. Also, in IL they have to pay you for your improvements if they come in and mine your property. The real estate broker told me (prior to finding the mineral rights weren't reserved) the best thing I could do was build a house right in the middle of the property. I expect he was alluding to the 300' restriction someone else mentioned.

I also found out that in some circumstances the owners of the minerals can be taxed even though the minerals haven't been extracted.

ToadHill · Nov 19, 2009

When I bought my land I bought it in pieces. The lot that the house is on 2.5 acres I bought from owner A and he didn't have mineral rights, they stayed with the farmer he had purchased this plot from.

The farmer retained the mineral rights because he had a 20 year lease with a gas and oil development company.

I then bought several other pieces of property from the farmer, a 4.5 acre piece, several years later a 17.25 acre piece and finally about 15 years ago a 62 acre piece.

When I bought the last piece the contract with the development company had expired and as part of the deal the farmer convayed the 62 acres to me as well as the mineral rights to that piece + the rights to the other 24.5 acres we had purchased earlier.

Since then I signed a contract with a development company which gave them the right to drill for gas or oil for a period of 5 years. They paid me an up front amount and a negotiated amount for anything they may discover. If they didn't drill in the 5 years they lost the right to do so unless we renegotiated the agreement.

They discovered about 6 months after they signed the agreement that I had my lawyer insert language that gave me free gas for my home if any was discovered. They wanted to take that out of the contract and when I refused they just didn't drill. The lease has now expired.

That's good for me since in the last few years we've discovered that our land in over the Marcellis shale deposit and the going rate for leases is about 400% higher than they had been and the pumping value is 5 times what it had been.

heehaw · Nov 20, 2009

i was looking for someone from Tn to jump into this thread: because i have "heard" but don't know if its true or not, that in Tn, after a certain number of years, the mineral rights go back to whoever owns the land: 20 years is what i heard: i have seen a couple of instances here in Arkansas, that drilling rigs were set up where the land owner did not want them, an try as they did, they could not do anything about it: they were compensated, but according to the landowner, it wasn't enough: but is it ever enough?
heehaw

tallyho8 · Nov 20, 2009

Earlier this year there was a bill introduced in the Arkansas legislature that would make mineral rights revert back to the original landowner if no action was taken on them in 20 years. The bill was deferred.

heehaw · Nov 20, 2009

i kept 50% of the mineral rights on 5 acres i sold a couple years ago: even though nothing has been done, i still pay taxes on those mineral rights: don't remember how much it was last year?? a buck or two i think?? i also own mineral rights on 3/4 acre i sold in the early 80's: we get about $113 a year from them: have never been billed for the "property taxes" on that 3/4 acre: until finally, last year i looked it up an took it to the assessor: best pay the taxes rather than let someone else start paying them an lose the little we get..
heehaw

roamerr · Nov 22, 2009

I ride ATV's in WV near the Northfork area. My understanding of mineral rights there is different then what I have heard elsewhere. In WV my understanding is the Mineral right holder also has the rights to any trees over 8" in diameter. I have several friends that own property and I think L&M Land Co holds their mineral rights and has the forestry rights also. One had the area around his land logged recently -- he did not care since his place is seasonal for ATV's but it definitely changed his view.

Dargo · Mar 10, 2010

heehaw said:
i was looking for someone from Tn to jump into this thread: because i have "heard" but don't know if its true or not, that in Tn, after a certain number of years, the mineral rights go back to whoever owns the land: 20 years is what i heard: i have seen a couple of instances here in Arkansas, that drilling rigs were set up where the land owner did not want them, an try as they did, they could not do anything about it: they were compensated, but according to the landowner, it wasn't enough: but is it ever enough?
heehaw

I've been looking into this since the price of gas, oil etc. has really gone up. In many states the rights do in fact revert back to the surface owner if no action of any sort has been taken for 20 years. Even though it may have been 50 years since the property has been touched, selling mineral rights on the commodities markets has been hot, hot, hot business lately. Some surface owners think there has been no action in many decades only to find out that the minerals under their land has changed hands 5 times in the last 10 years.

I'm just starting a 'battle' (negotiation?) with a company because they plan to drill down something like a couple thousand feet and then go horizontal (away from my property) but they need a place to store what they recover. That is where I come in. They own the mineral rights under my land which, fortunately or unfortunately, seem to be very few. They want to take up about "five to ten acres" to store the fuel they recover from under adjacent land. I hadn't thought about that and I don't know how it works.

All I could find out is that in Indiana there are very strict laws protecting waterways, lakes and ponds. I may take off a few weeks from work and start digging all sorts of little ponds all over the place on the part of my land they want to use. This seems like a weird situation to me. Honestly, I'm almost never there, so it's not like I'll have to look at it every day. However, it will certainly affect the value of my property. I need to keep doing research to find out if I need to start digging right away. You know, those little ponds sure are nice to look at.