Can I force a co-owner to sell?
100% success! If you have a shared-ownership or joint property in Spain, you need to know that you can put an end to this situation and you can force the sale of your share of the dwelling.
If you want to sell your share but cannot reach an agreement with the other co-owners, you can sue and file a lawsuit against the other co-owners. The judge will force them to sell and then each person in the deeds will receive the profits from the sale according to their share and according to the title deeds.
The defendants can only contest the claim and oppose the lawsuit if you all agreed not to sell the asset during a certain period. If this is not the case, the other people in the deeds will not have any legal grounds to contest it and will be forced to sell and finish with the joint ownership.
If there are any debts between the co-owners for the home expenses or any other type of debts, these expenses can be claimed in the same case and will be part of claim started against them. Once the asset has been sold and the money has been shared between each coproprietor, if any of them owes you money due to the expenses borne by you like taxes, utility bills, improvements you made, and they should pay you and settle their debt to you as well.
Forced sale of a jointly owned property in Alicante, Torrevieja, Costa Blanca.
If you did not reach an agreement with the other coproprietors not to sell the house, this claim has 100% guaranteed success.
The correct procedure is called Division de cosa común (division of common property)
Let’s take a look at what the action for division consists of.
When an asset (flat, premises, land, estate, etc.) is owned by more than one person, and one of them does not want to continue with this shared proprietorship, the so-called action for the division is available.
By means of this procedure, the court is requested to extinguish the condominium , either by awarding each of the owners a part in full title when the house is divisible, or when the asset is indivisible by transferring the house and distributing the proceeds among all the holders in proportion to their share.
Examples of actions for these cases:
A) A rural holiday residence is owned by 4 persons. One of them does not want to continue in this situation of indivision and requests the division of the home into 4 equal portions, as the home is divisible.
B) A flat is owned by 3 people. One of them does not want to continue in community with the rest and requests the Court, in view of the fact that the flat is an indivisible dwelling (it cannot be divided into three equal parts), to put it for sale it and divide the price according to the participation that each one had in the community.
The action for division procedure in the Spanish courts.
This action constitutes an indisputable and unconditional right for any holders and is of such a nature that its exercise is not subject to any obstacle, except when there is an agreement between the coproprietors not to dissolve the condominium and to preserve the undivided thing.
This agreement, if it exists, may not exceed 10 years and may be extended by new agreement. Article 400 of the Civil Code: “No co-owner shall be obliged to remain in the community. Each of them may at any time request that the common thing be divided. However, a consensus to keep the undivided thing for a fixed period of time, not exceeding ten years, shall be valid. This period may be extended by new accord”.
In 90% of the cases, we reach an agreement with the other owners before having to go to trial. The fact of receiving a claim against them makes them think that you are serious about the sale, and they will have no other way than to agree to it. If they do not respond to the claim and accept it, they will go to trial and they will have to pay for your legal fees so any lawyer will advise them to agree to the claim and sell the dwelling before it is costlier to them.
If you do not want to continue sharing a home with someone, please contact us and we will inform you about the process to finally get out of the shared ownership. Every consultation is free.
CC Lawyers Alicante is your trusted law firm in the Alicante area.
Please contact us if you have any legal matter that needs to be checked by a Lawyer in Alicante.