Late in 2011, I was asked to give a speech at the first annual Youngstown Ohio Utica & Natural Gas Conference & Expo, held at the Covelli Centre in downtown Youngstown. Our friends over at the Youngstown/Warren Chamber of Commerce were kind enough to record the bulk of my presentation. It is viewable below:
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Now that much of the new leasing has slowed down, many of our clients are being asked to sign a lease amendment. These people are already under a lease from many years ago. The trouble with an old lease is that they were written to accommodate shallower wells, as well as the way the oil and gas business operated thirty some years ago. The environment has changed dramatically since then, and it shouldn’t be surprising that the language in leases has, too. Energy companies therefore need to modify the terms of the old lease to allow them to economically drill new Utica wells.…
Six months ago I wrote an update on Ohio oil and gas leasing. Since that time, lease activity in Ohio has changed somewhat. New Utica wells continue to be drilled, but it can take a while to learn about their production capabilities. Some of these wells will be drilled and left alone for a period of at least 4 weeks. This is done for geological reasons and has to do with the pressure of the reservoir. Drilling companies also like to keep the success of their wells secret lest they inform their competitors of valuable drilling strategies. For the most part, the same energy companies I mentioned in January are still around: Chesapeake, Devon, Hillcorp, Shell, Anadarko, Hess, Gulfport, Consol, and XTO (Exxon).…
We get lots of phone calls from folks who want to purchase land, either at a sheriff’s sale, at auction, or just from a local seller. They want to know if the mineral rights are included in the sale. These people want to buy land and quickly lease the mineral rights for a sizable signing bonus that can often offset a large portion of what they just paid for the land.
In a private transaction, the Seller will frequently make that information available to the buyer. In an auction or at a sheriff’s sale, most often the auction or title company will make no guarantees about the mineral rights.…
Many of our clients seek our expertise in reviewing an oil and gas lease that has been offered to them. These people have been approached by oil and gas companies that are interested in accessing the oil and gas under their land. When reaching out to landowners, these companies usually have a pretty good idea as to whether or not that particular landowner is eligible for an oil and gas lease. Even so, sometimes landowners who are eligible for an oil and gas lease aren’t offered a lease. This could be for a number of reasons. Acreage size is probably the most important of these reasons.…
How do you determine if your oil and gas lease is still in effect?
This is one of the most common questions we receive. It typically comes from landowners who had signed an oil and gas lease many years ago and want to take advantage of the current lease frenzy. That is, landowners who have signed an oil and gas lease in the 1970’s or 1980’s want to know if they are eligible for a new lease and the signing bonuses that come with it. The answer to this question can be very valuable, as bonus payments for signing an oil and gas lease today are much much higher than they were twenty or thirty years ago.…
On Nov. 30, 2011, I had a chance to address landowner rights during the YOUNG 2011 Conference & Expo in Youngstown, Ohio. This post has an embedded video of the one hour presentation that I gave that day.
Recently, I’ve been receiving a number of calls from prospective clients who are looking for ways to extract themselves from an old lease that covers their property. Various scenarios exist: (1) an old lease was signed years ago, but no well was ever drilled; (2) a well was drilled, but has sat idle for some time, with no royalties being paid; (3) a well was drilled and royalties have been paid, but they are sporadic or of a very small amount. With the recent increase in leasing in Ohio, and considering the large sums being offered, these clients want to know if they can cancel the old lease to allow them to sign a new lease for large dollars.…
