I am in a situation involving questions of intestate inheritance of mineral rights under Texas law. Boiling it down to its essence—
Assume a man owning such rights has three sons, two of whom have children of their own and one who does not. Assume that one of the sons with children predeceases the father. (Also for simplicity assume no spouses in the picture).
Question One: Upon the father’s death, do his mineral rights get split three ways, per stirpes, so that the children of the predeceasing son receive one third, as do their uncles? [I think this would be the case.]
Question Two: Assume as a next step that the son who had no children then dies. Does his one third interest transfer exclusively to his only surviving sibling (with nothing going to the children of the brother who had died first) or is his interest divided equally between the two other branches, with his surviving brother getting half and the children of the first brother getting one half?
Guidance would be greatly appreciated!
I saw somewhere that Texas laws in this regard may have changed a number of years ago. This might affect my situation. Can anyone give me leads to track this down?
The current Texas law for intestate distribution is in the Texas Estates Code, Subtitle E, Chapter 201. You might check out Sections 201.001 through 201.003. The statute is pretty easy to read and can be found through the texas.gov/Legislature website. Keep in mind that there are a number of court cases that interpret these statutes and in some cases change how they are applied. To see whether any of these cases might apply to your situation, you would need to consult a Texas attorney.
Thanks.
I guess in what I am asking in Question Two is the actual outcome when the childless brother’s real estate “passes in parcenary . . . to the person’s siblings and the siblings’ descendants” (Section 201.001 may be fairly easy to read, but not so easy to comprehend).
I was hoping that that the situation is sufficiently common that there is a ready answer.
There are few ready answers in legal matters as so much hinges on all the facts and circumstances of a situation, in light of statutes and case law. Aimee gave you good advice to consult an attorney who is familiar with oil and gas and estate law. Gather the information on all generations of intestate owners, including birth and death dates, marriages, and offspring for all the members of each generation. Add any information on the acquisition of the minerals, to determine if these are separate or community assets, and copies of most recent deeds into the owners and any probate records. Are the minerals in one or more Texas counties? If the minerals are in other states then you need to satisfy the title requirements in those states. The attorney can then tell you what other information is needed.
The fact pattern is not difficult and an experienced Texas probate attorney can provide an answer once a few more facts are developed, which will determine which type of probate procedure will need to be done for each estate.
All this is sound advice, and well intentioned—and I appreciate your taking time to respond. But I am really trying to get an answer to my specific question.
There are plenty of lawyer websites and other legal literature that discuss the substance of the law, with due caveat (“This is not a legal opinion.”). I just haven’t come across anything that drills down to this particular detail under Texas law, and I’m hoping that this forum would fill the gap. I tried to frame my post in the nature of a follow up question from the audience at a CLE program.
The context is that I have a whole bunch of distant family relatives who are looking at a big pot of money sitting in Texas mineral receivership. I am trying to run down who MIGHT (“This is not . . . ) stand to gain the most so as to take the laboring oar to orchestrate all the claimants, hire a local lawyer to review and file the claims, etc.
So, please, despite a number of responses already, let’s keep this post alive to see if someone can help out with a specific answer.
Apologies, but an attorney cannot competently or ethically give you an answer to your question without getting a full fact statement from you, checking for any relevant court decisions and then making a determination of how the statute applies to your situation. We are prevented by the law and the code of ethics from doing so.
Aimee correctly explains that no one can give you a definitive opinion as to intestate inheritance without full and detailed information. Your original post already asked for an opinion based on several assumptions, such as no spouses even though there a multiple generations. Now you have stated that there is a mineral receivership involved. Mineral receiverships is a complex area which will require specialized legal experience. A receivership is established by a legal proceeding and you should be able to obtain copies from the court. The receiver should have additional records. The attorney can advise you on what the requirements are to get some or all of the minerals out of the receiver.
As the facts become more developed, the complexity has increased greatly. If you want to protect your legal interests, you will need to hire and pay an experienced attorney.
What if I reframe the question like this, so that no lawyer runs the risk of going to jail for answering my question:
As a purely factual matter (without expressly any legal opinion whatsoever), what do you think an experienced lawyer on a continuing legal education discussion panel would say in answering the question if it were posed by a member of the audience?