Joint tenants – each owner owns an undivided interest in the whole property, but if the interest is sold, the joint tenancy ends and the owners become tenants in common. If one of the joint tenants dies, the deceased person's interest automatically goes to the other joint tenant.
Joint tenants also own an undivided interest in property. The main difference between joint tenants and tenants-in-common is that, upon the death of a joint tenant, that co-owner's interests are extinguished and the surviving co-owner(s) receive the property.
Joint tenancy should be used with extreme caution. It can subject a co- owner to unnecessary taxes and liabili- ty for the other co-owner's debts. It can also deprive heirs of bequeathed prop- erty and, in California, leave the joint tenant without right of survivorship.
Joint tenancy is most common among married couples because it helps property owners avoid probate. Without joint tenancy, a spouse would have to wait for their partner's Last Will to go through a legal review process—which can take months or even years.
Further tenancy in common allows parties to hold unequal shares of property interest. Joint tenancy requires each co-owner to hold equal shares of property. Further, co-owners must transfer the deed at the same time. In this sense, joint tenancy is rigid compared to tenancy in common.
Tenants in common gives you more protections and you can specify in a deed of trust what you would want to happen in the event of relationship breakdown (eg if one of you has first dibs to buy the other out, or a time limit on doing so etc) which is definitely better to decide now whilst you still like each other!
A right of survivorship means that property owned by multiple people will automatically pass to other owners when one owner dies.
As part of the recent budget passage, New York State adopted legislation that allows for Transfer-On-Death (TOD) deeds pursuant to N.Y. Real Property Law §424.
Common ways to hold or transfer property to avoid the New York probate process include: Living trusts. The State of New York allows residents to create a living trust for nearly any type of asset, including houses, properties, vehicles, and bank accounts. Co-ownership. Beneficiary designations.
Real property New York recognizes tenancy by the entirety for real property conveyed to the spouses, unless there is documentation that another form of ownership exists.