Got an Unsolicited Offer?

A letter shows up offering a specific dollar amount for minerals you may have forgotten you owned, and the first honest question is not whether to accept it, but how that number was arrived at in the first place.

We know how these letters get built because we’ve watched the process from the other side of the table. It's not random. Someone pulled county production records, cross-referenced them against ownership records at the courthouse, ran a quick decline model or comp analysis, and mailed a letter to every owner who came up on the list. You weren't singled out. You were one line on a spreadsheet.

That doesn't make the offer bad, but it does mean the number was built for speed and volume, not for getting you the supported purchase price on your specific interest. Understanding the model behind the letter tells you exactly how to respond to it.

How Your Name Ended Up on the List

Mailers like this get generated from public records: state production and royalty data tied to well API numbers, county deed and division order filings, and sometimes probate or lease filings if that's the specific angle the sender is working. If you're getting a royalty check, your name and county are attached to a producing well in state records, which is searchable. There's nothing improper about how they found you, it's simply public information compiled at scale.

Manufactured Urgency Is a Red Flag, Not a Real Deadline

Some mailers include language suggesting the offer expires in a matter of days, and that urgency is almost always manufactured rather than a real market constraint. A tract worth buying today is generally still worth buying next week, and a buyer with a genuinely competitive number won't need a countdown clock to close the deal.

If a deadline is making you uneasy, that discomfort is worth listening to. Take the extra few days to call around, and treat any pushback on that request as useful information about the buyer, not an inconvenience, since a fair number rarely evaporates over a short delay.

How the Offer Was Priced

Volume mailers are almost always priced off a blanket formula applied across the whole mailing list, something like a multiple of recent monthly royalty income, adjusted lightly for the play. That formula is fast to generate thousands of letters but doesn't account for your specific well's decline stage, nearby permitting activity, or whether an operator is about to drill an offset well that would change your interest's trajectory. It's a reasonable starting point, not a final answer.

A buyer who's done real diligence on your specific tract, pulling your well's actual production history and checking activity in your section, can often price more accurately than a blanket mailer, sometimes higher, sometimes lower, depending on what that specific diligence turns up.

How to Actually Benchmark It

Don't sign the first letter that arrives. Call the sender and ask exactly what production data and comparable sales they based the number on, request a second offer from a different buyer to compare against, and pull your own recent division order statements to see whether the offer's implied multiple lines up with what you'd expect given your well's age and decline. A legitimate buyer won't flinch at these questions or rush you to sign before you've had time to ask them.

Questions Mineral Owners Ask Our Review Desk

Each answer helps identify the asset and its evidence before a forecast or purchase number is allowed to drive the file.

Is it safe to give my information to a company that mailed me unsolicited?

Verify the company is a real, established buyer before sharing sensitive details, but a mailer arriving unsolicited isn't itself a warning sign, it's how a large share of legitimate mineral purchases in this industry start.

Should I just ignore the letter?

You don't have to respond, but it's worth at least calling to ask how the number was calculated, even if you have no intention of selling right now. That conversation costs nothing and gives you a data point for the future.

Why did the offer come in so much lower than I expected?

Blanket mailers apply a standard formula across an entire list and don't always reflect nearby permitting activity or a well's actual decline stage. Getting a second, more tailored offer is the best way to see whether the first number undershot.

How many offers should I get before deciding?

Two or three written offers is usually enough to see whether the numbers cluster together or whether one is an outlier in either direction. More than that rarely changes the picture much and mostly costs you time.

Is a mailed offer less trustworthy than one from a local buyer I already know?

Not inherently. Plenty of legitimate buyers work primarily by mail because it's efficient at their scale. What matters is whether the company is verifiable and willing to answer direct questions about how they arrived at the number.

What information should I avoid giving out on that first call?

You don't need to share your Social Security number or banking details just to get a preliminary conversation going. Save sensitive financial and identifying information for after you've decided to move forward with a specific, verified buyer.

Apply the buyer view to the next property question

The same deed, decimal, well history, and operator evidence carries straight into these related reviews from the buyer's desk.

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Executors settling an estate with mineral rights face a specific process. Here is how it works, who targets probate filings, and what pricing looks like.

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Leased but Undrilled

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