Sell Mineral Rights in Andrews County, TX

Andrews County has been producing oil since the 1930s, which means mineral ownership here almost always comes with more history — and more paperwork — than a newer play.

Andrews County sits on the western shelf of the Midland Basin, bordering New Mexico, with the city of Andrews serving as the county seat and courthouse. It's one of the original Permian Basin oil counties, first developed for shallow San Andres and Clearfork production starting in the 1930s, and it's since become a busy target for horizontal Wolfcamp and Spraberry drilling — the combination locals and landmen often call the Wolfberry.

For mineral owners, that layered history is a mixed blessing. On one hand, a tract that's been productive for eight or nine decades has usually generated a real, documented track record of royalty income, which gives you and any buyer something concrete to evaluate instead of pure speculation. On the other hand, that same history means chain of title can run through multiple leases, several generations of heirs, and more than one round of pooling or unitization — all of which needs to be sorted out before a sale can close cleanly.

The review starts with what actually drives value for Andrews County mineral interests today: which formations are producing on your specific tract, how the county's older vertical wells interact with newer horizontal units, what to expect from the courthouse records, and how to read an unsolicited offer against real production data instead of a form-letter number.

The Wolfberry Stack and What It Means for Your Tract

The term Wolfberry refers to the combined Wolfcamp and Spraberry section that operators in Andrews County have developed together with horizontal drilling, often stacking multiple wells at different depths under the same surface acreage. A single spacing unit can include wells targeting the upper Spraberry, lower Spraberry, and several Wolfcamp benches, meaning your mineral interest could be tied to four, six, or more producing wellbores rather than just one.

That density is generally good for royalty income but makes valuation more complicated than a simple per-acre number. A buyer pricing your interest should be looking at a well list specific to your unit, not a countywide average, and should be able to explain how many of those wells are already producing versus permitted but not yet drilled.

Older, shallower San Andres and Clearfork wells still dot much of the county too, some drilled as far back as the 1930s and 40s and still marginally producing today. If your tract has one of these legacy wellbores alongside newer horizontal development, get a breakdown of production by well — lumping a stripper well doing a few barrels a day in with a robust horizontal unit muddies the real picture.

How Andrews County Chain of Title Gets Complicated

With production history running back nine decades in parts of the county, it's common for a family tract to have gone through several full lease cycles — an original 1930s or 40s lease, a mid-century renewal or new lease when a second round of drilling arrived, and a modern lease or ratification tied to horizontal development. Each of those events generated its own recorded instrument at the Andrews County Clerk's office, and a serious buyer's landman will trace all of them before making a real offer.

Heirship is the other recurring issue. Minerals that have passed through two, three, or four generations without formal probate at each step create gaps in the record that show up the moment anyone tries to verify ownership. If your family's interest was divided informally — a handshake agreement among siblings, say, rather than a recorded deed — that needs to be fixed with proper documentation before you can close a sale, and it's worth doing regardless of whether you sell, because it protects your family's ownership either way.

If your interest sits near the county line or straddles old survey boundaries, double check the legal description against current Railroad Commission unit plats. Older surveys in West Texas occasionally don't line up cleanly with modern spacing unit configurations, and a mismatch there can hold up a title opinion.

Reading a Mineral Offer Against Andrews County Reality

Unsolicited offer letters circulate heavily through Andrews County because of how much drilling activity there's been. Most are built off broad market data, not your specific tract, and they're priced to work for the buyer on a portfolio basis — some tracts they overpay slightly, most they underpay, and it nets out in their favor across hundreds of letters. That's a legitimate business model, but it's not obligated to give you a fair number, and you shouldn't treat the first letter you get as the market.

Ask any serious buyer three things before you engage further: which wells they're valuing your interest against, what recent permitting looks like in your specific section, and how they're treating decline on any horizontal wells already a few years into production. If they can't answer with specifics tied to your tract, they're pricing off an average, and you should keep shopping the interest.

Pull your own recent royalty statements — 12 to 24 months if you have them — and compare the trend to whatever number you're offered. A check that's held flat or grown suggests continued or new development on your unit; a check in steady decline suggests you're mostly looking at the tail end of existing wells, which is a different value conversation.

Where to Start at the Courthouse

The Andrews County Clerk's office, in the courthouse in downtown Andrews, is where you'll pull deed records, lease instruments, assignments, and any recorded pooling or unitization orders. If your family has owned the interest for multiple generations, ask the clerk's staff about indexing by grantor and grantee name across decades rather than just the current owner, since older instruments sometimes indexed under a name that's changed through marriage or estate transfer.

For production and well status, the Railroad Commission of Texas keeps public records searchable by county, lease name, and API number, which will show you current operator, well status, and historical production volumes for anything touching your tract. Cross-referencing courthouse title records with Railroad Commission production data is the single best way to walk into a sale conversation knowing more than the buyer expects.