North Dakota Hunting Rights Sale Ban
September 15, 2008
Before you jump to any conclusions, it’s imperative you look a bit further into this ban that is in place in North Dakota on hunting rights. What this ban does is stop the practice of a landowner being able to sell the hunting rights to his land for a lifetime. In other words, before the ban, I could buy a piece of property in North Dakota, sell the hunting rights to that land to another party, which they would then have those rights for a lifetime and then tomorrow I could resell that same piece of land. I am assuming the new buyer would be able to negotiate to buy back the rights.
I am always looking for ways to increase hunting opportunities and for those of you who know, I am a strong advocate for property rights. I’m not a legal expert but I think this is as much a legal issue as a property rights issue.
Some feel that as the owner of a piece of land you should have the right to do with it as you please. The question then becomes whether or not you can sell this right beyond your ownership of the land. What makes answering that question even more difficult is the fact that the state of North Dakota already allows the lifetime sale of rights for other things - the right to mine coal, graze livestock, pump water and explore for oil. Should we now be able to add hunting rights to this list?
Existing laws of course set precedence and it certainly would seem a fair question to ask what’s the difference in selling lifetime rights to graze livestock as to hunt the land?
As a landowner, you should be aware of the fact that often when encumbrances, such as the sale of rights, easements, etc., are included in land, it can drive the value down. I would assume too that under the right circumstances it could drive the price up but I’m still trying to figure out how in this case.
Here’s a simple example of how something like this might work. I bought a 10-acre parcel of land with an old farmhouse on it. At the time I bought the property, I didn’t realize that my neighbor had water rights on my land. How this occurred is simple to explain. The previous owner of the land and house I bought deeded the rights to an existing well to his neighbor after he sold him a lot of land. The buyer of the lot of land, built a house and struggled to find a viable water supply, so the original land owner deeded him water rights.
Some time after I was in the process of selling the farmhouse and a 2-acre piece to go with it. My friend, who is the local surveyor, discovered the deeded water rights to that well, which hadn’t been used for nearly 30 years.
I wanted to clean up the deed which would also increase the value of my property, albeit slightly. So I worked with the neighbor to take care of that.
So, the question comes back to whether or not it is legal to sell hunting rights in the same way you can sell or grant water rights, oil rights, etc..
The existing ban in North Dakota expires next year and legislators and landowners are setting up for a battle.
Tom Remington
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In general, I don’t like this idea at all. BUT… I’d say let the market decide, don’t legislate even deeper into the affairs of the people.
Here’s the deal. TX has a similar arrangement whereby you can sell or lease mineral and water rights, and that arrangement is valid even after you’ve sold the land. When I was thinking about buying property in TX, whenever I saw that the land included that kind of arrangement, I dropped it from my list of possibilities. Simple as that. I’d say let the same thing happen in ND.
I do think sellers should be forced to disclose these agreements to prospective buyers (I think this is already the law), but other than that… let the buyers decide.
I can’t tell from your post whether you support property rights or not. You seem to regard it as an open question, at least with regard to the owner’s disposal of his property of which disapprove.
David - I’m not sure who you are addressing, me or the last commenter?
I support property rights. Anyone who spends anytime at all here knows that quite well. The way the post is created is done in such a way as to create an open question as you say because as it appears to me, the laws in ND leave a lot of open questions.
The two biggest being that one, does the property owner have the right to sell the hunting rights to his land? and two, even if it is determined one way or the other, the existing laws set precedence, i.e. that you can sell mining, oil, etc. rights. With that we have to ask why should the selling of hunting rights be excluded while the others remain?
The other question I have is would there be a problem of selling off another “right” on the land if it was something other than hunting?
I think people still question whether or not someone should be able to sell a right that would carry over to another landowner. There are of course several ways of looking at this. Some look at it as selling a right to something they may no longer own into the future.
Others see it as a modification to a piece of property of which a subsequent owner then can purchase knowing full well there have been rights sold. So long as that information is not being withheld from a perspective buyer, then I guess the onus is on the buyer to make that decision.
No matter which side of the argument you fall on, it’s complicated or can be.
I still believe much of the decision being made on this is being too strongly influenced by the fact that it involves hunting.
DeKrey said he believes it is a mistake for landowners to permanently sell the right to hunt their land, but he said lawmakers should not continue to ban the practice.
“I personally think it’s a bad deal to sever. I think leasing and options like that are a whole lot smarter on the landowner’s behalf,” DeKrey said. “But even if I think it’s smarter, I don’t think it’s our business to tell them what to do.”