Partition & Co-Ownership  ·  October 8, 2026

Can You Evict a Sibling From an Inherited House in California?

The short answer

You usually cannot evict a co-owner. If you and your sibling both hold title to the house, you are tenants in common, and each of you has an equal right to possess the whole property — not a half each. An unlawful detainer action is built on a landlord-tenant relationship, and your sibling does not occupy the house under you.

What California law gives you instead is two things: a claim for ouster, which can make your sibling liable to you for the rental value of your share, and a partition action, which ends the co-ownership. Civil Code section 843 provides a statutory route to establish ouster on a 60-day clock that starts when service of your written demand is complete — a date that is not always the date the demand was handed over.

Section 843 is not available to everyone: it does not apply to the extent an agreement, the instrument creating the cotenancy, or another written instrument already provides an alternative remedy. Check the trust or deed first.

One threshold question changes everything: is the estate still in probate? If it is, the house may not be yours to fight over yet.

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Is the house still in probate, or has it already been distributed?

This is the question that decides which body of law you are in, and it has to be answered first.

While the estate is in administration, the personal representative — the executor or administrator — has the right to, and must, take possession or control of the decedent's property to be administered in the estate, under Probate Code section 9650, subdivision (a)(1). The representative is also entitled to receive the rents, issues and profits from the real and personal property in the estate until the estate is distributed, under subdivision (a)(2), and must pay taxes on, and take all steps reasonably necessary for the management, protection and preservation of, the estate in their possession under subdivision (b).

Subdivision (c) is the one that matters for a sibling in the house. It allows real property to be left with, or surrendered to, the person presumptively entitled to it — unless the representative determines that possession is necessary for administration. And the person holding it must surrender the property when the representative requests it.

So if your mother's house is still in probate and your brother is living in it, the person with standing to do something about that is the personal representative, not you as a beneficiary. If you are the personal representative, subdivision (c) is your lever.

Once the estate is distributed, that changes. You and your sibling now hold title directly, as tenants in common, and the Probate Code is no longer the operative framework. You are in the law described in the rest of this article.

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Why can't you just evict a co-owner in California?

Two reasons, and they stack.

First, you each own all of it. Civil Code section 686 provides that every interest created in favor of several persons in their own right is an interest in common, unless it was acquired by them in partnership, for partnership purposes, declared in its creation to be a joint interest under section 683, or acquired as community property. A tenancy in common is an undivided interest. Your 50% is not the east half of the house or the upstairs. Each cotenant is entitled to possession of the entire property, which is why your sibling living there is not, by itself, wrongful.

Second, unlawful detainer is the wrong tool. Code of Civil Procedure section 1161 defines who is guilty of unlawful detainer, and every pathway in it runs through a landlord-tenant or possession-under-another relationship: a tenant holding over after the term expires (subdivision 1), a tenant in default on rent after a three-day notice excluding weekends and judicial holidays (subdivision 2), a tenant who breached a non-rent covenant after the same three-day notice (subdivision 3), assignment, subletting, waste, nuisance or use of the premises for an unlawful purpose (subdivision 4), and failure to surrender after the tenant's own termination notice (subdivision 5). Subdivision 7 provides that "tenant" includes any person who hires real property, excluding transient occupants described in Civil Code section 1940, subdivision (b). The section became operative in its current form on February 1, 2025.

A sibling who inherited an undivided interest is not hiring the property from you. There is no term to expire and no rent reserved. An unlawful detainer filed against a cotenant on that footing is vulnerable to challenge on the ground that the statutory relationship the remedy depends on does not exist — and because unlawful detainer is a summary proceeding built around that relationship, the problem is not one you can usually cure by amending.

A caution worth stating plainly. This is the general rule for a true cotenant. It does not resolve every situation that looks like one. If your sibling signed a written lease with the estate or with you, if they were only ever a permissive occupant with no title, or if title is itself disputed, the analysis is different. Confirm who actually holds record title before choosing a procedure.

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What is ouster, and when does a co-owner owe you money?

Because both of you may occupy the property, your sibling living there rent-free is not automatically a wrong. The doctrine that converts it into one is ouster.

In Zaslow v. Kroenert (1946) 29 Cal.2d 541, the California Supreme Court described ouster as the wrongful dispossession or exclusion of a cotenant from common property they are entitled to possess (at p. 548). It requires acts of an adverse character — claiming the whole property, denying the cotenant's title, or refusing to permit the cotenant to enter. On the facts, the court found an ouster where the occupying party's agent changed the locks, posted "no trespassing" signs, and denied entry on demand.

Two practical points from Zaslow. The ousted cotenant does not need to have been in actual possession at the time of the ouster. And the remedy is recovery of common possession plus damages for loss of use, ordinarily measured by the ousted cotenant's share of the value of use and occupation since the ouster — the court declined to let the ousted cotenant abandon his interest and force a sale as a remedy for ouster itself, where there was no showing that the cotenant could not regain common possession and that the ouster was permanent.

The practical consequence for inherited property: if your sibling simply lives there and has never shut you out, you may have no ouster and no rent claim. If they changed the locks or told you to stay away, you likely do. The difference is usually conduct you can document.

The Civil Code section 843 route: a 60-day clock you start yourself

California has a statutory procedure for establishing ouster. Civil Code section 843 was added by Stats. 1984, ch. 241 — this is long-standing law, not a recent reform.

Subdivision (a) sets the scope. Where two or more persons concurrently own real property, a cotenant out of possession may establish an ouster by the cotenant in possession under this section. It does not apply to the extent the out-of-possession cotenant is not entitled to possession, or an agreement, the instrument creating the cotenancy, or another written instrument provides an alternative remedy. It supplements and does not limit other ways of establishing ouster.

Subdivision (b) is the mechanism, and the details are strict:

• You serve a written demand for concurrent possession on the cotenant in possession.
• The demand must specifically reference section 843.
• The demand must reference the time within which concurrent possession must be offered under that section — the statutory 60 days running from completion of service, not a deadline you select.
• Service must be made in the same manner as service of a civil summons.
• Ouster is established 60 days after service is complete if the cotenant in possession does not offer and provide unconditional concurrent possession within that period.

When the clock starts: on completion of service of the demand — not on the date you wrote it, not on the date you mailed an informal letter, and not on the date your sibling first refused you entry.

Subdivision (c) lets a damages claim for an ouster established under the section be brought as an independent action, within an action for possession or partition, or in another appropriate proceeding. The applicable statute of limitations still runs. Establishing the ouster is not the same as establishing the amount: damages still have to be proved, ordinarily through evidence of the property's rental value for the period, which usually means an appraisal or a broker's opinion.

Subdivision (d) preserves everything else: before or after a demand is served, cotenants may seek partition, agree on possession rights, agree to payment of reasonable rental value in lieu of possession, or agree to other appropriate terms.

Three things tend to go wrong with a section 843 demand. A demand that never cites the section does not meet subdivision (b)'s express requirement. A demand sent by ordinary mail is not served in the manner of a summons. And an out-of-possession cotenant who accepts a conditional offer of access — "you can come by on weekends," "you can have the back bedroom" — may have accepted something the statute does not require them to accept, muddying whether the 60 days ever ran. The word unconditional is doing real work in subdivision (b).

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How do you force the sale of an inherited house?

Ouster damages compensate you. They do not get you out of a co-ownership with a sibling who will not sell.

Partition does. Code of Civil Procedure section 872.710, subdivision (b), provides that, except as provided in section 872.730 (which concerns partnership property), partition as to concurrent interests in the property shall be as of right unless barred by a valid waiver. You do not have to prove your sibling behaved badly, and you do not have to show that selling is fair. Under subdivision (a), the court determines at trial whether the plaintiff has the right to partition.

For inherited houses, the modern framework matters. The Partition of Real Property Act, Code of Civil Procedure section 874.311, applies to real property held in tenancy in common where there is no agreement in a record binding all the cotenants which governs the partition of the property (subdivision (b)), in actions for partition of real property filed on or after January 1, 2023 (subdivision (c)). The Act gives cotenants who do not want a sale the chance to buy out the interest of the cotenant who does.

Note the condition in subdivision (b): if the co-owners are bound by an agreement in a record that governs partition of the property, the Act may not apply at all. A record is broader than a signed document: section 874.312(d) defines it as information inscribed on a tangible medium or stored electronically and retrievable in perceivable form. With inherited property that agreement can be a trust provision or a family settlement nobody thought of as a partition agreement. We take that up in whether a co-ownership agreement can block a forced sale.

We cover the buyout mechanics, valuation, the 45-day election window that runs from the court's notice of the buyout right, and the final accounting in detail in our article on the cotenant buyout right under the Partition of Real Property Act, and the separate problem of property held in an entity in what happens when the LLC owns the house.

If the house is rented to a third party rather than occupied by your sibling, the tenancy raises a separate question that the partition action has to resolve — see does a tenant's lease survive a partition sale.

Note how the section 843 route and the partition route fit together: a section 843 demand served early starts a 60-day clock that can establish ouster, and the resulting damages claim can be brought within the partition action under subdivision (c). The two are not alternatives you must choose between.

Does it matter that your sibling has been paying the mortgage and taxes?

Yes, and usually in their favor at the accounting stage rather than yours. A cotenant who pays taxes, insurance, mortgage or preservation costs is generally entitled to contribution from the others, and a partition action includes a final accounting of charges and credits upon each cotenant's interest, with Code of Civil Procedure section 872.140 authorizing allowance, accounting, contribution or other compensatory adjustment among the parties according to the principles of equity. That accounting is where "I paid for everything for six years" and "you lived there rent-free for six years" meet. We walk through it in the cotenant buyout article.

The short version for planning purposes: the sibling in the house often has a real contribution claim, and the sibling out of the house often has a real occupancy-value claim only if there was an ouster. Those two claims tend to be argued against each other.

What should you do first?

• Confirm the title status. Is the property still in probate, or has it been distributed? Pull the deed. Who is actually on it, and in what capacity?
• Write down the conduct. Dates you asked for access, how you asked, what was said, whether locks changed. Ouster is proved with conduct, and memory degrades.
• Decide whether you want possession or an exit. They lead to different first moves. A section 843 demand is aimed at possession and damages. A partition action is aimed at the exit.
• Do not file an unlawful detainer against a cotenant without a lawyer confirming the relationship is genuinely landlord-tenant.
• Do not improvise the section 843 demand. The reference to the section, the reference to the statutory 60-day period, and service in the manner of a summons are elements, not formalities, and a defective demand does not start the 60 days — you begin again from the date of a corrected, properly served demand. As a practical matter, have a registered process server effect service rather than doing it yourself — proof of service is the last thing you want to be litigating when the 60 days are what you are trying to establish. And decide before you send it what you want the answer to be: if your sibling responds by offering unconditional concurrent possession, no ouster is established, no occupancy damages accrue, and you have committed yourself to actually sharing the house. That is a successful outcome under the statute. Make sure it is the outcome you want.

If you are in one of these, our partition and quiet title practice handles co-ownership disputes of exactly this kind.

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Common questions

This article is general information about California law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Statutes and case law change, and how they apply depends on the specific facts. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes. Robert B. Mobasseri, State Bar No. 193193, ROMO Law Group, Encino, California.