Question: Can a landowner enforce a right of first refusal bargained for by his predecessor? Answer: It depends. (Note to self: Why do you always say that in your posts? Because, as Texas Rangers’ manager Ron Washington might say, “That’s the way the law go”.) The answer in MPH Production Co. v. Smith et
It ‘s tough to find an interesting picture of a title dispute, so here’s a musical interlude. You never can tell how the court will construe a complicated property deed.
Can the seller of land retain half of the minerals he owns in the property if he doesn’t actually reserve anything? Yes, he can, says
With apologies to Click and Clack, from time to time I will post “puzzlers”, questions about title and similar issues that have no apparent answer. Here is the first one:
Joe Bob Joiner owns a non-participating royalty interest under a tract. The amount of interest he owns is tied to the amount of royalty stated
A “strip” is just what it sounds like: A narrow parcel of land. A”gore” is a strip in another form, such as a triangle or other odd-shaped parcel. When a grantor conveys land he owns adjacent to a narrow strip that thereby ceases to be of benefit or importance to him, he also conveys the narrow strip unless he reserves the strip for himself by plain and specific language. These random tracts can be valuable when there is oil and gas production and can be lost without careful contract drafting.
Escondido Services, LLC v. VKM Holdings, LP, Escondido Services, 321 S.W.3d 102 (Tex. App—Eastland)
The contract of sale for the property mentions that you, the seller, intend to reserve the hard minerals, but not the oil and gas beneath the property. The deed to close the transaction contains no reservation of anything.
Continue Reading The Reservation Was Not in the Deed