Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: Property ownership

The Statute of Frauds requires agreements that transfer interest in land to be in writing to be enforcable. The only exception to this rule is when a party is estopped to assert the Statute of Frauds. It does not appear from the facts you have provided that you would be able to circumvent the Statute of Frauds.

If a person is unwilling to voluntarily relinguish their title through negotiation and payment then the only remedy that you have is to file an action for partition. By the way 3,000.00 doesn't sound like very much for any real property in the state of California especially if the land can support human life.

Very truly yours;

Re: Property ownership

Let's start with some basics about co-ownership of real property. Title can be held by two or more persons as joint tenants or as tenants in common. The differences between the two come into play mainly upon the death of a co-owner. If the owners held as tenants in common, the deceased co-owner's interest passes to his or her heir(s) according to the will, trust or rules of intestate succession. If the owners were joint tenants, the deceased person's interest passes immediately to the surviving tenant(s). Another small difference is that joint tenants' interests are always equal, e.g., 50-50 or 1/3-1/3-1/3, whereas tenants in common can hold in any proportion.

Cotenants of either kind have the non-exclusive right of possession of the entire property. Thus, the family member who doesn't live there has at least a theoretical right to move in at any time and become a de facto roommate of the other. Thus, neither cotenant owes the other rent for his or her own use of the property, but if the tenant in possession receives income from rents to a third party, selling off the timber, etc., it must be shared with the other cotenant(s).

Cotenants cannot adversely possess against one another, because the possession of one is not adverse; it is a matter of right. There is an exception to this; if the tenant out of possession was "ousted," i.e. prevented from exercising his/her right to share possession, then the possession can become adverse.

Ending a cotenancy is accomplished by filing a special kind of lawsuit called a partition action. The suit asks the court to order the property divided or sold, and the net proceeds distributed fairly. Partition is a right of all cotenants, but it can be lost by waiver. Carrying a partition suit to completion is expensive, but more often than not the parties settle before final judgment. Settlement can be by negotiated buy-out or an out-of-court sale.

Oral agreements to sell interests in real property are generally not enforcable, but in addition to estoppel, an exception may be made where there is "part performance" as was the case here, where payments began but were not fully made. You should therefore not give up on enforcing the oral agreement, but in filing to enforce it, I would also include a demand for partition by sale.

Re: Property ownership

In a nutshell, not without a lawsuit. First, if one person is living there and pays all the taxes and has receipts to show he spent money maintaining the property, unless all those payments total more than half the amount that would be received from having rented the property out, he may owe money to the person who has been deprived of living there! The one living there is the only one getting the use of the property. The one not residing there is entitled to one half the rental value of the property. Secondly, agreements respecting real property must be in WRITING to be binding, and you can't get around this legal requirement by witnesses to a verbal agreement, no matter how many you can find. Lastly, if two people are on title and one wants to remove the other, he can file suit for partition and the court will order the property sold and determine how much each is entitled to receive from the sale proceeds.