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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Marbleyes" data-source="post: 198070" data-attributes="member: 675"><p>There was a bill in the legislature a few years back that was going to tax mineral owners but it got shot down. I’m not 100% sure why but I would imagine partly because of the enormous nightmare that would have created. I’m guessing the 5% tax was done because it’s waaaay easier and it is done in lieu of a property tax on mineral owners. When this initially came up I was wondering how in the hell they would figure out who owns what minerals and how they were going to get ahold of them or their heirs, not to mention how they were going to enforce penalties on people who don’t live in this state or even in this country or are simply not even aware that they own minerals in the first place. There is a lot of money (I’d bet 10’s of millions) currently held in suspense by oil companies because they can’t find the mineral owners or any heirs to pay them their royalties. The state would have had to pay people who do what I do to run title on every tract of land in the state to figure it out and even then, there would have been endless lawsuits because these mineral conveyances aren’t always black and white and a lot of times are done by attorneys who have no clue what our state laws are and create a lot of ambiguity with the way some of these deeds are written. Who would foot the bill to pay people to figure this out? Keep in mind the state would have to compete with what oil companies pay for this type of work and I promise you that the residents of ND would have thrown a shit fit over that cost, and rightfully so.</p></blockquote><p></p>

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