JOINT TENANCY. A form of own ership of real or personal property, in which each owner is conceived of as owning the whole as well as an undivided and proportional share of the property. This is described by the quaint and untranslatable expression that the ownership is per my et per' tout. It is of a curiously limited charaeter and eau exist only when there is a unity of interest, time, title, and possession; that is, when the owners have identical interests, accruing by one and the same conveyance, com mencing at one and the same time, and held by one and the same undivided possession. They must all hold upon one and the same conditions in every respect, each of thuin being regarded as having possession of every pareel and of the whole estate. not indeed for every purpose, but in respect of tenure and survivorship. For the pur pose of alienation cash joint tenant has a ri,ght only to his undivided relative share of the prop erty, and the purchaser of such right does not succeed to the position of the seller as a joint tenant, but becomes a tenant in coi»mon with the surviVOI'S of the joint timaney who have not alienated their shares. if there are two tenants, each may dispose of an undivided half; if four, an undivided quarter, and so on hut the pur chaser cannot enter upon the exclusive posses sion of his share. for the estate must remain undivided, subject to an entirety of interest on the part of each joint tenant. and to what is called the prineiple of survivorship. by which is meant the right of the last survivor to the whole property. ln other words, when ono of several joint tenants dies his share passes to the sur vivors, and so on until the last survivor takes the whole interest, whatever it may be, and upon his death it will pass to his heirs. This right of
survivorship, or juts acereseendi, as it is called, is the principal and characteristic incident of a joint tenancy.
An estate in joint tenancy cannot arise by de scent or act of law, hut only by purchase or acquisition, as a grant, a devise, or a disseisin. In this country such tenancy is comparatively the law presuming nothing in its favor, but inclining rather toward tenancy in common, which excludes the principle of survivor ship, and implies that the estate may be divided and each tenant take his proportionate share. By the common law. indeed. any conveyanee to two or more persons without qualification was presumed to be in joint tenancy; but by statute in many American States this presumption has been reversed. and such a eonveyance declared to be a tenancy in eomnam unless the deed creating it contains an express statement to the contrary. An is. however. generally made in fa vor of conveyances to eNe•lllor: or trustees, which are still deemed to he in joint tenancy. Joint tenants arc regarded in law as a single owner as respects third parties. and they must therefore all be joined in any suits that concern their joint estate. Possession by one tenant is deemed the possession of all. and a eonveyance to one a conveyance to all. See ENTIRETY, TENANCY BY Jetxr OwNEasnin: CommoN. TENANCY IN; PAR CENARY. Consult Blackstone, Commentaries on the Lairs of England.