On a deed, a married couple is automatically joint tenants with rights of survivorship

Attorney Tom Olsen: There's one other form of ownership and that is for a married couple. I always refer to husband and wife but there are gay couples these days, but we're talking about a married couple. If you have both of the names as a married couple and after those words you have the words a married couple, husband and wife, or husband and husband, there's no tenants in common, there's no joint tenants rights or survivorship, they're just identified as a married couple, what happens then?

Attorney Holley Knapik: With that, in Florida, it will default to survivorship. If one spouse pre-deceases the other, the surviving spouse automatically owns the property. No hassles, no probate. That's based on the fact that they are married and own the home jointly.

Tom: Holley, I don't know if I've ever told you this before, but occasionally I'll see a deed where the property is owned by a married couple but after their names there is no identification that they're a married couple. It just has Bill and Jane, period. When they took title to the property they were married, but whoever prepared the deed did not identify them as a married couple. The question is, are they going be joint tenants rights of survivorship because they're married, even though the de doesn't say so? I think the answer to that, generally, the answer is yes.

Holley: Generally, it is yes.

Tom: We can go back and do an affidavit that says that the survivor of them, let's just say that Jane survives her husband, if she'll do an affidavit that says, okay, on the day that we brought this piece of property, the day that that deed was prepared, and ever since that date, we've been a married couple. if she signs an affidavit stating those facts then they will automatically be husband and wife, automatically be joint tenants rights survivorship. We would not need to do a probate for the husband.

Holley: Correct.

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