Legal Question in Real Estate Law in New Jersey

Re: Home Deed

m Deed in 2 names, unless originally specified as being "tenats in common" cannot be changed by only 1 of the owners. This is particulalrly true of JTROS. However, if your partner can establish, in a suit to quiet title, that the JTROS was a mistake, a Court may allow a change. This is more a ,oral issue between the partners, especially since it is vacation home, not the primary residence.

Re: Home Deed

I usually agree with Mr. Levine. This is an exception. One joint tenant may, during his lifetime, tranfer his right to an undivided half-interest in the property to another person or entity. That can be done without the consent of the other tenant. It destroys the joint tenance and creates a tenancy in common between the new tenant and the remaining tenant. It consequently also destroys any rights of survivorship in either tenant.

What one joint tenant cannot do is transfer his /surivorship/ right to any other person. So, if you partner wants his daughter to have an interest in the vacation home, he can deed all or some fraction of his interest to her now. That destroys the joint tenancy and you would keep a one-half interest as a tenant in common with her or with both of them.

For a good article on the subject, see:

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Joint+Tenancy