Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: If the debt is in my name are the things mine?

Title to personal property does not follow the debt. Personal property usually belongs to the person or persons who purchased it, i.e., who paid the initial acquisition cost and initially received possession. If an item were purchased with your credit card, that creates an initial presumption that it is yours, but the presumption is easily rebuttable by evidence showing that, at the time of the purchase, you were sharing expenses and property with someone and the intention at the time was that the property was to be co-owned.

I'd say what you have is mainly a money claim against you former partner for the excess payments you'll have to make over what he has or will pay, and also a claim to half ownership of the property purchased during your "arrangement."

There are books available about living together arrangements and much of California's current law is based on the case of Marvin v. Marvin and later cases refining the concept.

Essentially, if you were not registered domestic partners under the recent California statutes, the law will treat you as ordinary contracting individuals in a business-type relationship, and apply the everyday rules of contract, partnership, agency, property and similar law to your situation.

Practical advice depends upon the amount of money potentially at stake. The California Small Claims Court limit is now $7,500. Due to the higher costs and longer wait in going to Superior Court, any claim for less that $10,000-12,000 is probably better scaled back to $7,500 and handled as a small-claims matter.

Re: If the debt is in my name are the things mine?

If you are unwilling to confront him you do not have much of a chance to get your property back, If you purchased and are paying for property, you should be entitled to the property. Since the property is in Ca, you will need to go back and either convince him to give you the property or sue him for it. If you still have rights of entry to the premises where the property is stored, you can go get it when he is not home. If you do not have rights of entry, and if he does not agree to return the property, your recourse is to sue him for the monetary value of the property.