Also known as: entire tenancies · tenancy by the entirety
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
Concurrent ownership of real property by spouses in which each holds title to the whole estate with an indestructible right of survivorship.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
Edward Everett and his wife Evelyn Ellison held their home as tenants by the entirety. While divorce proceedings were pending Edward executed a will leaving the home to his brother. Edward died before the divorce was final. Title passed automatically to Evelyn by survivorship and the will had no effect on the house.
Eva Espinosa conveyed land to her daughter Emanuel Escobar and son-in-law Ethan Evans as husband and wife together with their bodily heirs. The jurisdiction recognizes fee simple conditional estates and tenancies by the entirety. The deed created a conditional fee held by the couple as an entire tenancy.
A grantor attempted to convey a conditional fee to two unmarried siblings and their descendants. The jurisdiction permits tenancies by the entirety only when the conveyance is to husband and wife. The deed failed to create an entire tenancy because the grantees were not married.
A husband owed federal taxes. The IRS placed a lien on real property the couple held as tenants by the entirety. The Supreme Court held that the husband's rights in the entire tenancy constituted property reachable by the federal tax lien.
A husband and wife held farmland as an entire tenancy. The husband died leaving a will that attempted to devise his interest to their adult children. The court held that the entire tenancy passed automatically to the surviving wife outside probate.
Prison officials refused to allow an inmate to marry. The Supreme Court recognized that marriage carries important legal incidents including the ability to hold property as tenants by the entirety. The ruling protected the couple's right to create an entire tenancy upon marriage.
No. Property held as an entire tenancy passes by operation of law to the surviving spouse and cannot be disposed of by will.
The conveyance must be made to two persons who are husband and wife and must include the issue or a designated class of their issue. The jurisdiction must also recognize tenancy by the entirety as an allowed form of concurrent ownership.
Yes. Because each spouse owns the whole property as a single legal unit, a creditor of only one spouse cannot attach the land held in an entire tenancy.
…individual creditors. This issue is one of first impression in this jurisdiction. A brief review of the present state of the tenancy by the entirety might be helpful. Dean Phipps, writing in 1951,[^maj-1] pointed out that only nineteen states and the District of Columbia continued to recognize it as a valid and subsisting institution in…