Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

An extension of the Pauli Principal in quantum physics says that two objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Unfortunately, lawyers are notoriously bad at math and science, which is why we generally intelligent people go to law school instead of into medicine or engineering. One result is that we have the idea of joint tenancy. The legal concept of joint tenancy would require parallel universes to actually work as designed, because it gives each joint tenant pretty much each and every right that they would have if they alone owned the property. They can only sell, borrow against, etc., their own share, but in terms of use and occupancy, it's as if they each own the whole thing. That means they can each rent out the whole thing without the other person's involvement at all.

Having realized that this can become quite messy, we invented two other things. The first is the joint tenancy agreement. This allows cooperative, reasonable joint tenants to limit and allocate their rights in the property, so that they can harmoniously own and use the property together. This is the proper way for multiple people to own income rental property, for example, or how multiple owners of small multi-unit buildings in rent controlled cities like Berkeley and San Francisco each occupy one unit while evading the condo conversion limits in those cities.

For situations where one or more joint tenants are irrational and uncooperative, we have invented the partition action. In the old days where most property was used for farming or game reserves, partition literally divided the parcel and allocated half to each joint tenant by court order. Now, with modern subdivision and zoning laws, and much property occupied by buildings, the courts can no longer divide the property.

Instead they order it sold by the sheriff (just like an enforcement of judgment foreclosure) and the proceeds distributed according to complicated rules regarding credit for contributions to the acquisition and ownership of the property. Basically, any loans are paid first. Then the distribution starts at 50/50 (or 25/25/25/25 or whatever) and then each joint tenant asserts claims for reimbursement where allowed, and the court comes up with a final allocation fo the proceeds.

The trouble with this is that a property never brings anything close to full market value when sold by the sheriff. So all the joint tenants lose a lot of money. For this reason, even the most irrational, uncooperative joint tenant usually comes around when faced with a partition action, and most often the parties negotiate a deal to sell the property and divide the proceeds by agreement, or if they cannot agree, then to sell the property by agreement and only take the allocation issue to court.

First, I am in full agreement with Mr. McCormick's answer.

Next, as to the "right to obtain the renter's contact information," I would have to ask, from whom, and for what purpose? From the renter? From the other joint tenant? I would be inclined to think that if just asking for it doesn't produce the desired results, then perhaps a lawsuit followed by discovery questions would -- thus establishing that the second individual on title has a "legal right" to the contact information. So -- yes, there is a "legal right" to the information, but that right would have to be enforced in court if the other party possessing the information is at first unwilling to share it. That's my answer to your questions #1 and #2. As to question #3, Mr. McCormick has provided a detailed answer, but the short answer is "yes."