Oil and gas help

[Oily]

Need help or advice. Anyone with oil and gas experience. I have owned 20% of 4 wells and the lease on 640 acres for 23 years . I have been getting free gas for my home use for 35 years. I still own 20% of the lease and also have royalty on this property. The majority owner which owned 60% sold to a different operator and tonight 9-28-18 The new operator dug up my gas line to my house and shut my gas off to my house. I have a disabled daughter and my 4 year old grandson living with me. Do I have any recourse to get my gas back with the grandfather clause ? I have no written contract for using free gas for my personal use but verbal OK'S from 3 Oil companies for the last 35 years including the last operator that I bought my 20% with for the last 23 years. If any oil and gas friends or lawyers on here can give me any advice I would appreciate it.Your friend, cold shower. Bye the way my moniker is Oily because i have worked in the oilfield for 40 years. Mostly self employed and this is the first lease operator that i have any problem such as this.All other operators that I have worked for have been salt of the earth guys that appreciate hard work and give praise or bonuses!!! Any advice would be appreciated as I am physically broke down and on fixed income. Thanks Oily

[bbogue1]

You need a good contract lawyer. Can you show you have been getting free gas for any great length of time? Those documents or lack of will be the crux of the argument. A good lawyer will know what rights you have and quite possibly a work around. You might start by contacting your home insurance and asking who could advise you. Most likely they will have a short list of lawyers or, depending on the insurance contract they may even have a dog in this fight. At the lawyers after you've talked about the existing contract situation ask him about the possibility of negotiating a new contract. The new contract will include a hold harmless clause to protect the provider from the possibility of future lawsuits (housefires) so be sure your home insurance payments are always current. This is a toughie, best wishes.

[Oily]

Will talk to a lawyer Monday but don't know how that will go as there is no clause in the original lease/ contract.I own 20% of the oil and gas lease as a working interest. A large oil company is drilling 2 horizontal wells 1 mile from my property and the new operator on my leases is trying to bully me into selling my interest to him for pennies. He is spending money needlessly trying to bankrupt me such as painting the equipment and moving equipment around for no reason. This is on low production wells that were drilled in 1964 and the net revenue monthly is only $800.He has already spent over $9000 and that will take at least 1 year to pay off with no other problems with the wells. I am already trying to find a propane tank and orifices for all my appliances and heating unit. Hopefully oil and gas attorney can give me some advice. Thanks for the replies and info. I will not be bullied by this jerk! New wells being drilled near me are in a deeper zone so if they come in good like their prediction other companies will most surely want to drill on my lease so I have a big stake in this. I will just have to fight this guy until new wells start producing. Sorry for the long winded rant but I am getting a little gamey smelling with no shower and cooking everything outside on grill and griddle.Your friend Oily

[Petrol & Powder]

I don't know enough to give you advice but it sounds like you may be out of luck concerning the free gas if that was never put into a contract. It sounds as if that was an accepted practice but not necessarily a protected practice. I might be inclined to chalk that up to, "It was good while it lasted" and move on. You may have to cut your losses there.

As for your 20% ownership in the existing wells, I'm not sure I understand how another fractional owner can incur expenses (painting equipment and moving equipment) and force other fractional owners to share those costs if the other owners didn't agree to taking on those expenses.
Again, I don't know enough about that type business arrangement.

I think I would sell my interest to that guy, BUT ON MY TERMS, not his. Get your price and get away from that idiot.

Your plan on hiring an attorney for advice is the best course of action in my opinion.

[MT Gianni]

Agree with the attorney. You need to also recognize the majority owner is not the only buyer out there.

[Oily]

Thanks for all the advice as all is good advice as my attorney told me this morning. As odd as it seems my attorney called the operator this morning and the operator agreed to let me lay a line from the central tank battery to my house, 1500' at my expense of course. Propane would cost me 3 to 4 hundred a month during the winter so it is a no brainer as I have 2000' of poly line stored on my property! Funny how a call from a well known attorney can change the dialogue from bully to reasonable business man. Only downside is my wife fell at work today and broke her hip at the ball, femur junction. Surgery went great and now she has a partial hip replacement and is doing fine. But this halts my work on laying the line for gas to my house. When it rains it pours in my life lately. But rockrat you are correct as the wells that are being drilled close to me by a large oil& gas company that has the leases all around me except my section and one other next to mine is why I will not sell to this wannabe bully. You are correct on the JIB as this is his attempt to force me out before the new wells are completed. PM to follow

[Mr_Sheesh]

I have seen dishonest lawyers do some serious damage to peoples' interests; In this state, one mine (it had ~2 Bil in very fine gold dust in it) was basically stolen at pencil point from the owner, for $10k a month, because they got an "Exploratory" license from the owner. They explored it all right - Explored the WHOLE ore body and extracted all of it they could, paying the owner nothing more than the $10k a month. He was definitely ROBBED.