Locating Your Mineral Rights on a Map
The first step of mineral management is to know what you own!
Request an offer on your mineral rights:
How Do I Locate My Oil and Gas Leases?
You might have inherited your minerals from a relative that kept poor records or perhaps you didn’t even know you owned mineral interest until a landman contacted you, offering to lease your minerals.
Even if you inherited your mineral from a well-organized relative, the topic may be new and unfamiliar to you.
Let’s start by locating the legal description, which will help you find the property on an interactive map. Once you’ve found your property, you can explore the wells in which you own interest as well as the oil and gas activity in the surrounding area.
4 Steps to Locating Your Mineral Rights
Finding the Legal Description
Legal descriptions vary from state to state and can differ greatly when referring to many acres of land or small urban lots.
How Do I Locate the Legal Description?
If you inherited an interest in a producing oil or gas lease, the legal description should be available by:
Using a GIS Viewer
Oil and Gas GIS Viewers all work in the same general way. There should be some way to search based on a combination of the county and the following information from your legal description. In many states, is this is called the Public Land Survey System (PLSS).
- Range
- Township
- Section
- Block
- Abstract
- API
You can even overlay this map with geology maps or drilling activity maps to see if your mineral rights are located in an active area.
GIS Viewers for the top Oil & Gas Producing States
Mineral Management Spreadsheet
Lower your risk by keeping title documents, leases, and division orders in a folder along with one royalty statement from each operator.
The details about your mineral rights, including land tracts, units, leases, wells, and division orders should be organized in a spreadsheet or mineral management software.
Download the Free Mineral Management Spreadsheet.
Want to know more about managing your mineral rights? We have video about the advantages of actively managing your minerals, what documents you should keep, how to organize your files, monthly royalty audits, evaluate mineral management software, and if it's all too overwhelming, how to outsource the management of your mineral rights.
Why People Sell Their Mineral Rights
Why People Sell Their Minerals Rights:
I am one of the millions who lost their job due to the COVID-19 lockdown. I sold my minerals to get me through this terrible time. If my grandmother could see our current situation, she would understand. I'm so grateful to have had minerals to sell. Many people don't have this option.
With the price of oil declining and operators practically giving gas away, I decided to sell before the bottom falls out.
I am tired of paying taxes and managing small mineral rights that don't really add up to much. It would be a pity to further divide the minerals among my children when they are worth so little. Also, I don't want to obligate my children to the expense of having an attorney file ancillary probate in each county - just to transfer the ownership. It's best to sell the minerals now and put my affairs in order.
My oil wells have been producing for decades and the reserves are almost depleted. Once the wells are plugged, the value will be significantly lower. I'd rather cash out now.
I inherited mineral rights, but don't want to be involved with fracking and fossil fuels. I would prefer to support renewable energy and do my part to reverse climate change.