Where can we find the title opinion for our mineral interest?
Or, should we hire an attorney to help us look for the title opinion?
Not sure what you’re looking for. The company that operated the well had a title opinion rendered for their benefit when the well was drilled and completed. They are not likely (as in never) to share it with you. So, you could hire your own attorney to render an opinion as to what you own. But, depending on what you’re after, a landman would be a lot cheaper to hire and tell you the title. We need a little more background on this question.
Thank you for your response. Very helpful. The operator wanted to see our title opinion. We showed them the deed, a division order, and document stating we have a working interest. We think it may be worth still checking it over and looking for the chain of title or a lease. Hope this helps.
I think you can get there with an ownership from a reputable landman. they may have to lay out their chain of title, so the operator can see.
This is a read flag that they may not agree with you owning anything. Tim is right. You can have a landman pull the deeds in the chain and provide them to the operator with a Working Interest Ownership Report. It helps to seek out a CPL registered with the AAPL for credibility. Good luck!
Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you. I appreciate the advice.
The main question is, what problem are you trying to solve? As Tim said, youre never going to get an operator to send you a division order title opinion. You can however ask for the comments and requirements in which it seems you are most likely listed to see if they will share that with you, if you or the heir you got it from arent listed in that, then youre really fighting an uphill battle. I would not pay anyone to go on a wild goose chase unless you know exactly what the issue is and if its able to be solved. Even if you do pay a landman, its then going to be their work vs the title attorneys work, 9.5 times out of 10, the title attorney that prepared the title opinion is going to be right
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If I may(?), I have a quick question in regards to title opinions done by oil companies.
I’m wondering why wouldn’t an oil company want to share (or better yet, make a copy available for a reasonable price) an already completed–and paid for–title opinion on a section of land connected with you, a mineral owner in that section?
Unless I’m missing something, it seems to me that oil companies would stand to recoup at least some of their land men’s valuable time and expenses by selling a copy of a title opinion to land-relevant mineral owners who have interest in wells that the oil company is (or will be) drilling in?
I ask, as one oil company recently did very kindly provide a snippet of a Division Order Title Opinion to me, which was quite helpful. Granted, it wasn’t a full title opinion, but it makes me beg the question all the more–if the work is already done–why not make at least limited title opinions available for a reasonable charge to relevant mineral interest owners?
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Title information is both proprietary and gold for an oil company. No oil company is going to risk giving out information about unleased mineral ownership, whether or not the heirs are known, so that other companies can jump in and lease the minerals. I would guess that the oil company’s valuation of the data would greatly exceed your definition of ‘reasonable.’ What would stop the recipient from selling or passing the information on to others? It is very different to ask the oil company about your own title to understand your fractional minerals or to get a title problem cleaned up so you can be in pay under a lease.
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A title opinion is prepared by the attorney for the benefit of the oil company. The attorney and oil company have an attorney-client relationship. A typical title opinion will state that the opinion was prepared for the benefit of “ABC Oil Company”. The oil company cannot sell the attorney’s legal work as that could possibly constitute unauthorized practice of law.
Additionally, if done properly the title opinion should be subject to attorney-client privilege. By sharing the title opinion, the oil company can potentially lose the attorney client privilege. This could potentially make the title opinion discoverable in a court of law.
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I can certainly appreciate the legal concerns generated by what’s surely a significant amount of cost to research chain of title.
However, if the oil company isn’t willing to verify the Estate Probate themselves for chain of title accuracy, it’s possible the mineral owner may simply abandon any potential inheritance or funds in suspense due to sheer costs of getting chain of title done themselves.
No disrespect to attorneys or landman out there; it just seems that in the mineral interest realm, research time and fees required to claim/prove inherited funds can easily often outweigh any potential revenue or benefits.
I hear what you’re saying; I’m strictly referring to a ‘closed circuit’ (for lack of a better term) oil company and relevant mineral owner situation–in my case, simply trying to prove that an Estate Probate claim involving newly inherited mineral interests are indeed accurate.
This has peaked my interest in what the difference is between a “Title Opinion” and a “Chain of Title”.
If the mineral owners dont want to spend the time and money to claim/clean up their mineral interests and abandon them, thats on them. Why would the oil companies want to spend the time and money cleaning up peoples estates, its not their responsibility?
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@wilsonewallacepllc I believe @gdonner was attempting to discover industry practices as they relate to mineral owners and curative requirements. I am sure he appreciates your reasoning. There have been many on this forum that have said they have received a DSTO from an O&G Company; although, I find this unlikely with an exception for rare instances. Many DOA’s will elect to supply/share a mineral owners with a copy of a title requirement that was derived from the DSTO in order to assist with the “on pay” process. Too many people have considered this as sharing the DSTO which is not true.
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YES YES YES. I cannot tell you how many phone calls a week I get with folks asking for a Title Opinion or Chain of Title. The company I work for doesn’t necessarily rely on title opinions except for use as a starting point. We are not going to do the massive amount of legwork required. It is your interest, you are responsible.
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Apparently it goes both ways. Kind of like how a nurse in a nursing home once told me, “no-one wants to be here.” I suspect if more, older documents (pre-1980s?) were digitized and accessible online, it would be significantly cheaper for both oil companies and mineral owners alike to straighten out or at least verify mineral interest titles.
As an example: Out of ~$3,500 received from new interest, it also cost me ~$2,700 in legal fees just to get the new interest detailed in an Estate Probate. And then, only to be told by one oil company that that Estate Probate “wasn’t good enough” (in a nutshell) to prove title. So all the time and research the legal group did can apparently get flipped off by any oil company that wants to rebuff it. How many mineral interest owners are going to spend thousands more dollars on title research if they won’t be able to recoup it?
Now, keeping objectivity here: this is just one oil company. Another oil company had zero problems with what I sent–thank goodness! But the stark inconsistencies among oil and gas companies alone is sometimes enough to make any sane person question why they’d ever want to be involved in it, even on the receiving end as a mineral interest owner.
My aunt ditched her mineral interests in part because she lost literally thousands of dollars trying to get a simple quit claim filed in Tulare, California via a lawyer. The reason it was rejected by the clerk’s office? A paperclip wasn’t in the proper place. Just one example of the very costly absurdities you can run into.
Again, not decrying all lawyers and oil companies here. A number of them are legit and very helpful. But these are just some of the royal headaches that mineral interest owners have to contend with.
After being in this business for over 40 years as a landman, consultant, mineral buyer and mineral owner, the greatest motivators are the mistakes I have witnessed and made. I have talked with so many novice mineral owners and felt their frustrations with what they thought would simply be cashing checks. We all need to be more thoughtful and forward thinking. We all learn about economics, scale and unforseen costs. Think about this when you start to develop a plan to pass on or sell these interests.
You bring up digitizing documents pre 1980’s. Thats certainly not cheap, very time consuming and the county has to pay for it. Most of the counties where oil and gas production takes place are small counties, so they are already struggling with budgets and theyd rather have landmen/lawyers come out as it supports local gas stations and restaurants, the last thought on their mind is making it easier on the 90% of the people that own minerals in their county but dont live there.
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