ABSTRACT
Concurrent ownership of land describes the situation where two or more persons are entitled to the simultaneous enjoyment of property, whether that land be used for commercial or residential purposes. Prior to the 1925 legislative reforms, there were several forms of co-ownership: in other words, the legal relationship between the individual co-owners could take various forms. However, this caused numerous problems and one of the most important reforms of the Law of Property Act was to limit the types of co-ownership that could be created thereafter. From 1926, land may be co-owned only under a joint-tenancy or, alternatively, under a tenancy in common. In a joint-tenancy, as far as the rest of the world is concerned, the individual persons are as one owner (although, of course, as between themselves they do have separate rights). So, there is but one title to the land and the individuals own that title jointly. By way of contrast, under a tenancy in common, although each tenant in common is in physical possession of the whole of the property in common with the others (that is, there is no partition), nevertheless they are regarded as having a distinct share in the land (for example, one-third). Consequently, a tenancy in common is sometimes known as ‘an undivided share in land’.
