A recent California Court of Appeal decision highlights the importance of establishing property ownership interests before initiating a partition.
Background
The decedent and the defendant owned a property together, and after she passed away in 2020, the property's title became the subject of parallel legal proceedings. Since 2021, the defendant and the decedent's four surviving siblings were involved in probate proceedings concerning the property. Also, the siblings sought to partition the property in 2020. This is the issue in the appeal. The superior court entered an interlocutory judgment identifying the property's owners as the defendant and the decedent's estate and ordering a partition by sale.
The defendant claimed that the siblings lacked the necessary standing to sue for partition. She argued that she owned half of the property independent of the outcome of the probate proceedings and that the probate court had yet to determine who owned the other half. Thus, she argued that the siblings couldn’t have been the “owners of an estate of inheritance” in the property as required by Code of Civil Procedure § 872.210(a)(2) to bring a partition claim.
According to a 2005 deed, the defendant and the decedent co-owned the property in fee simple as joint tenants with a right of survivorship. This form of ownership entitled the defendant and the decedent each to an equal, undivided share in the entire property that would automatically pass to the survivor if one joint tenant died. So, the deceased joint tenant's interest passes to the other joint tenant instead of becoming part of her estate.
In September 2020, the decedent recorded a quitclaim deed she’d granted to herself that, if valid, severed the joint tenancy and created a tenancy in common with no right of survivorship. The result of a severance of a joint tenancy consisting of two parties is that each party continues to hold his or her respective property interests constituting a one-half fee title in the property; however, they hold it as tenants in common without the expectancy of receiving the other one-half interest at the other joint tenant’s death. As such, the co-tenants' respective interests in a property may be devised by will or passed onto their heirs.
In this cars, the decedent, who was unmarried and without children, died a few weeks after the 2020 quitclaim deed was recorded. In November 2020, the siblings brought a probate action to distribute her assets, including the property. A few months later, the defendant filed a competing petition for letters of administration. One year later, the probate court appointed an estate administrator. In March 2023, the defendant filed a petition to administer the will. A trial on the parties' competing petitions was scheduled for August 2025.
A few weeks before the estate administrator was appointed, the defendant sued two of the siblings seeking to cancel the 2020 quitclaim deed and quiet title to the property. The defendant said she owned the entire property because the quitclaim deed that extinguished the right to survivorship was invalid.
What is Partition?
The siblings responded to the quiet title action in part by filing a cross-claim to partition the property by sale. Partition is the procedure for segregating and terminating common interests in the same parcel of property. The partition changes the rights of the cotenants from common possession of the entire property into individual rights of exclusive possession of some portion of the property for each cotenant; however, this doesn’t involve a transfer of title. The parties already have the title, and their common title is merely being divided.
The siblings said the 2020 quitclaim deed was valid and, as a result, the decedent had an interest in the property that would eventually belong to them as her only heirs (because the right of survivorship was extinguished by this deed). The siblings noted, however, that probate proceedings concerning the decedent's estate were ongoing. In the superior court proceedings, the defendant never questioned whether the siblings had standing to bring their claim.
In January 2023, the court entered an interlocutory judgment for partition by sale, which required it to determine the interests of the parties in the property and order its partition. There are three methods of partition:
- Physical division of the property;
- A sale of the property and a division of the proceeds; and
- A partition by appraisal whereby one cotenant acquires the interests of the other cotenants based on a court ordered and supervised appraisal.
The judgment identified the record owners of the fee simple undivided interests in the property as the defendant and the decedent. It also recognized that the decedent had died and that an estate administrator had been appointed. The siblings were identified in the order as the “estate successors in interest/beneficiaries.” The judgment ordered the proceeds of the sale to be used for the costs of the sale, the satisfaction of any liens, and payment of the siblings' attorney fees, with any residue to be distributed equally to the decedent's estate and the defendant.
The defendant appealed.
The Decision of the Court of Appeal
Acting Presiding Judge William Dato wrote that the parties agreed there was a possibility that at the end of the probate proceedings for the decedent's estate, the siblings would collectively own part of the property. The question for the Court of Appeal was whether they “jumped the gun” by bringing their partition claim before that possibility was confirmed. The defendant asserted that they did because the probate court hadn’t yet decided who owned the property, which meant that the siblings couldn’t have been “owners of an estate of inheritance” which was required to bring their partition action. Although the siblings recognized that their ownership interest in the property hadn’t been confirmed, they contended that the judgment should be affirmed because the defendant's quiet title action was premised on her belief that they owned an interest in the property and because they were authorized to litigate their partition claim on the estate's behalf.
Judge Dato explained that § 872.210(a)(2) provides the standing requirements to bring a claim to partition real property. The judge said that consistent with this and with partition's purpose of splitting title amongst the current owners, the statute provides that a partition action “may be commenced and maintained by” “[a]n owner of an estate of inheritance … in real property where such property or estate therein is owned by several persons concurrently or in successive estates.”
This ownership requirement was met, the siblings argued, because the estate was intestate when they filed their partition claim. They relied on Probate Code § 7000, which provides:
Subject to section 7001 [which concerns estate administration,] title to a decedent's property passes on the decedent's death to the person to whom it is devised in the decedent's last will or, in the absence of such a devise, to the decedent's heirs as prescribed in the laws governing intestate succession.
They argued that they had title to the property since the decedent passed away and would continue to possess it until and unless the probate court ruled in the defendant's favor.
The judge wrote that the “basic purposes” of estate administration include “distributing the residue of the property … to those persons who are entitled to receive it,” quoting a 2008 decision. As such, at the end of the probate proceedings, the court will issue a final order of distribution that confirms the title which has accrued under the law of descent, meaning that if the probate court were to rule in the siblings' favor—and the property wasn’t sold or otherwise disposed of during estate administration—their title conferred in the property by Probate Code § 7000 would be confirmed and the date of acquisition would relate back to the date of the decedent's death.
However, this also meant that if the probate court were to rule in the defendant's favor—a possibility the siblings conceded exists—she’d acquire title to half of the property with an acquisition date that similarly relates back to the date of the decedent's death. Because the party seeking partition must have clear title, the uncertainty of the outcome of the probate proceedings precluded the siblings from establishing the ownership interest required to bring a partition claim under § 872.210.
The interlocutory judgment was reversed. Amundson v. Catello (Court of Appeal of California, 4th Appellate District, March 20, 2025).
Bottom Line
The California Court of Appeal reversed an order for the partition of property by sale, stressing that a clear ownership interest is required for standing to commence a partition action. This case also discussed the limitations on an heir’s ability to act on an anticipated inheritance, which reinforced the notion that property rights remain uncertain until the probate and administration are concluded.