Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

As a practical matter, they need to sign before you seek refinancing. A lender will want, in general, as many people on a deed as possible to increase the likelihood of mortgage payments being made, so may not want those people dropped. But once you start filing out papers if they have not yet quit claimed you will have to list them as part owners [which may help on the debt to equity ratio] and explain why they will not be on the loan that is supposed to be secured by the entire property. But it is better to speak to the potential lenders and find out what their policy is.

Usually, the co-owners you're buying out will want to be paid off in exchange for their surrendering their partial ownerships. Therefore, as I see it, the usual process is to go to a lender or lenders, or a loan broker, explain what you want to accomplish, apply for the loan, and open an escrow. The selling co-owners will then execute deeds which will be held in escrow until the loan funds and the closing can take place.

Shers is wrong, Whipple right. This is not really a legal question at all, by the way. Your mortgage broker should be able to guide you through this just fine. As Mr. Whjpple says, however, this is not uncommon and the "departing" owners normally sign their deeds to the remaining owner as part of the loan escrow process.