Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

You are suggesting that the purchase be treated like a stock. But here you are buying a single physical object and not merely rights that the corporation has agreed to redeem in cash. If you set up a land trust you might be able to do it that way, as the trust owns the property and you get a portion of the trust but not the land, except as it is an asset of the trust. I suppose the trust could hold back some of its shares and then distribute them as payment for additional work done on the property.

Be very careful as to the investment. Since a husband and wife are going to be your partners, what will happen if they divorce, if one dies and give some of the shares to their 3-4 children so that you now have 4-5 partners. Who will be the main person running the Land Trust, how will decisions be made, to whom is the rent sent, etc. You need to read some real estate books on what the problems can be and perhaps g t an attorney to find out what problems they can see occurring.

I agree with Mr. Shers' second paragraph ("Be very careful...." etc.), but not his first, trying to liken a flat dollar investment in real property to a purchase of stock.

Your question raises an interesting legal point: whether a tenant in common's stake can be specified as a particular, specific dollar amount of equity in the property, on the one hand, or whether it must be, as is traditional, a percentage of the fee. I am inclined to think it must be a percentage, rather than a flat dollar amount, but I cannot come up with a legal reason why this must be so, except that since total dollar values can fluctuate greatly, allocating fixed amounts to one or more interests could result in negative interests in the remaining owners.

Upon further thought, the answer to your question becomes somewhat clearer. Set the whole thing up as a partnership. The partnership then acquires a 100% interest in the real property. You and the married couple set up your rights and responsibilities in a partnership agreement. Your partnership agreement reflects all the changes in equity interest, etc. that may occur. It's conceptually rather simple this way, but you do need (a) thoughtful agreement-writing, and (b) a strong willingness on everyone's part to behave in a businesslike fashion.