Shared home ownership wears many hats

Ilyce Glink and Samuel Tamkin told I don’t own all of it. I thought I would own all of it on her death. What should I do?

A: Adding children to the title of personal residences, whatever the reason, is fraught with problems. Mistakes happen, and these can have far-reaching consequences.

When your mom put you on the title, you and she had different choices as to how to own title to the home. When she put you on title as joint tenants, the joint tenancy gave you and her equal ownership of the home. You could sort of say that you each owned 50 percent in the home, but under the eyes of the law you each owned all of the home.

How is that possible? Joint owners each own the entirety of the home, not their share. And, most important, when one owner dies, the other owner becomes the sole owner.

Another type of ownership of real estate is as tenants-in-common. In this situation, you could own 1 percent of the property and your mom could own 99 percent, or any number in between.

However, you have only an ownership right to that piece of the property. Upon the death of one of the owners, the home transfers to whomever the owner designated in his or her will, and that could be you or your siblings, or a different heir altogether. If there is no will, then the home passes to family members as designated by state law.

You and your mom started as joint owners with rights of survivorship, which meant that when she died, you would inherit her share of the property. But when she "gave" you a greater ownership in the home, she terminated the joint ownership and created an ownership where you were tenants in common in the home.

You then became the owner of 75 percent of the home but lost the right to become the sole owner of the home upon the death of your mom.

Now, you’ll have to probate the will and have the other 25 percent interest in the home transferred to you, if that’s the way your mom had it in the will. Assuming she didn’t designate you to own her interest in the home, you and your siblings will share the other 25 percent of the home, each of you owning 6.25 percent of that quarter ownership.

When it comes time to sell the home, you and your siblings will share in the proceeds from the sale. You will receive the cash from your 75 percent ownership plus cash equal to an additional 6.25 percent of the sale price.