Mineral Rights on a Warranty Deed
A warranty deed contains information pertaining to the ownership of a property. It is a guarantee that the owner holds a clear title to a piece of real estate, and therefore has the right to sell. Information pertaining to the ownership of mineral rights is found in the warranty deed.
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Features
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A general warranty deed is not limited to the time the current owner has held the property; it extends back to the property's origins. All documents pertaining to the transfer of ownership of mineral and surface rights should be recorded at the local county courthouse.
Ownership
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Possessing surface rights ownership does not guarantee mineral rights ownership. The United States and Canada permit separate ownership of mineral and surface rights. What this means is that for a given property, sometime in its history, mineral rights may have been sold to another owner. The situation where surface and mineral rights owners are different is called a "severed estate."
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Identification
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If you own a property, you should have received the warranty deed when you completed your purchase. If you lost the warranty deed, or you are researching a property that you do not own, the deed can be viewed at the local county courthouse.
Location
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In the warranty deed, there are a few places where information pertaining to mineral rights ownership can be found. The best place to look is the reservation section of the deed. If there are no notes regarding mineral ownership there, look in the title policy section.
Warning
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To ascertain mineral ownership, you may have to backtrack through years of warranty deeds to determine when the mineral rights were severed. If you are unable to determine mineral ownership by viewing the current title policy, at the county courthouse look up the immediately previous warranty deed. Depending on the courthouses policy, warranty deed will either be sorted and stored by property of owner. If there are no notes, in that warranty deed, keep backtracking until you find a reference to mineral rights ownership. Keep in mind that you will have to go to the county courthouse where the property is located.
Background
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Each state has regulations pertaining to the maintenance of mineral rights ownership. It is possible that a mineral rights owner lost his rights. If ownership was recently lost, there might not be a note in the deed. To make sure that the owner is in good standing, you can check with the state Bureau of Land Management for the state in which the property is located.
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