Ohio Partition Law

Each owner of a piece of property which is also owned by others has the right to divide the property if they no longer want to co-own it. In Ohio, the owners can voluntarily split, or partition, the property by reaching an agreement, or contract, which governs the disposition of the property. If they can’t reach a private agreement, a petition to partition the property can be sought from a court to split the property through a court order.

Despite the partition being voluntary or court-ordered, the land can be split in two ways:

Partition in kind, where the property is materially shared by the parties where each person receives title to their portion. While partition in kind is customarily maintained for undeveloped land, the other option, partition by sale, is mainly used for developed property where the property is marketed, and proceeds are apportioned among owners.

The manner of the division also depends on the parties’ relationship when they co-owned the property. Tenants in common may split the land or proceeds in the same way as they held ownership. If the owners were joint tenants, the proceeds must be split equally.

Ohio is a lien theory state. Any bank with an outstanding mortgage has a lien on the property which must be satisfied before property division. The advice of an Ohio real estate partition attorney should be sought if you co-own land in Ohio and wish to partition it.

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