LEGAL ISSUES ON JOINT OWNERSHIP OF PROPERTY BETWEEN HUSBAND AND WIFE IN NIGERIA

This legal illumination of Akintunde Esan[1] known as the Legal Adviser Online is on legal issues about marital property. A marital property is a property deemed to be jointly owned by a husband and a wife which their children or child has the right of inheritance over the property as a family property or parents’ property.

A matrimonial home is not necessarily a marital property. In order to ascertain whether a property is a marital property or not, consider the following legal issues[2] to avoid fighting a lost legal battle on a property:

1.The presumption of joint ownership of property exists between husband and wife, while    the marriage subsists, and that, the party that survives the other, inherits such property, and has power to administer it, the way he/she wants, this principle applies especially in statutory law marriages (or monogamous marriage)[i]

2.Most incidents of joint ownership of property between husband and wife occur where a  husband and wife contribute to purchase or to develop or to both purchase and develop a property.

3.The contribution may be financial or material, but it must be substantial and ascertainable.

4. Unless the spouse or child claiming contribution under a spouse is able to provide convincing proof of a direct and substantial contribution to the acquisition of the property, such spouse or child cannot claim joint ownership. This is particularly so where the property in question was purchased in individual name of the husband or wife.

5. In some other cases, a husband may purchase a property in the name of his wife or vice versa. In such circumstances, the law would presume an intention to gift the property. This is called presumption of advancement. Presumption of advancement can be rebutted by proving that no gift was intended.

6.  The mere fact that your mother was married to your father at the time a property was developed is not sufficient ground that the property belonged or devolves naturally on you without extrinsic evidence in support of such claims.

7. If you claim that, a property jointly belongs to your mother and father the burden is on you to provide evidence of joint financial or material contribution by both of them.

In case you seek for further legal illumination on legal issues on marital property in Nigeria, you can contact Akintunde Esan (The Legal Adviser Online) on phone or WhatsApp @ 08073828487 or email @ akintundeesan@gmail.com or @ ASE OLODUMARE CHAMBERS, Oshopey Plaza, 2nd Floor, Left Wing of Front Wing, No.17/19, Allen Avenue, Ikeja, Lagos State.

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[1] Akintunde Esan (known as the legal adviser online) is a Legal Practitioner/Legal Consultant/Chartered Mediator with two decades of litigation and transactional legal practice experience. He is the Managing Partner/Principal Consultant @ Ase Olodumare Chambers, a Lagos based litigation, property and transactional Law Firm.

[2] Per UMAR ,J.C.A in chibuzor & anor v. chibuzor (2018) LPELR-46305(CA)  (Pp. 27-29 paras. E)

[3] of Okere Vs Akaluka (2014) LPELR - 24287 (CA

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