Types of Joint Property Ownership in Florida

Florida recognizes three forms of joint property ownership: tenants in common, joint tenants with right of survivorship, and tenants by the entirety. Each form produces different consequences for estate planning, creditor protection, and how co-owners may transfer or encumber their interests. Choosing the wrong form of ownership can expose property to creditors, force unnecessary probate, or defeat the asset protection benefits a married couple assumed they had.

This article explains how each type of joint ownership works under Florida law, what distinguishes them from one another, and why the differences matter for anyone who owns property with another person.

Florida’s Default Rule: Tenancy in Common

Florida Statutes Section 689.15 establishes the default. Unless the instrument creating the estate expressly provides otherwise, any conveyance or transfer to two or more persons creates a tenancy in common. This means Florida does not presume joint tenancy with right of survivorship, and it does not presume tenancy by the entirety for unmarried co-owners. If a deed simply lists two names without further designation, the owners hold the property as tenants in common.

As tenants in common, each co-owner holds a separate, divisible interest in the property. Those interests do not need to be equal. One owner might hold a 70% interest and the other 30%, or three owners might each hold one-third. Each tenant in common can sell, mortgage, or transfer their interest without the consent of the other co-owners. A tenant in common can also leave their interest to any beneficiary through a will or trust.

When a tenant in common dies, their share does not pass to the other co-owners. It passes according to their will, their trust, or Florida’s intestacy statutes if they had no estate plan. This means the deceased owner’s share must go through probate, which can be time-consuming and expensive.

Tenancy in common provides no asset protection. A creditor holding a judgment against one co-owner can levy on that owner’s interest and force a partition sale. In a partition action, the court orders the property sold at auction and divides the proceeds among the co-owners according to their respective shares. The non-debtor co-owners receive their portion, but they lose the property itself.

Joint Tenants with Right of Survivorship

Joint tenants with right of survivorship is a form of co-ownership where each owner holds an equal, undivided interest in the property and the surviving owners automatically inherit a deceased owner’s share. The abbreviation JTWROS appears frequently on deeds and financial account applications.

The critical word in this ownership form is “survivorship.” When one joint tenant dies, their interest passes immediately to the surviving joint tenants by operation of law. The deceased owner’s will, trust, and heirs have no claim to the property. If three people own property as JTWROS and one dies, the remaining two each own half. When the second dies, the sole survivor owns the entire property outright.

Creation Requirements: The Four Unities

Florida law requires four unities to establish a valid joint tenancy with right of survivorship.

Unity of time means all joint tenants must acquire their interests simultaneously. Unity of title requires all interests to be conveyed through the same instrument. Unity of interest demands that each joint tenant hold an equal share. Unity of possession requires each joint tenant to have equal rights to use and possess the entire property.

Because Section 689.15 makes tenancy in common the default, creating JTWROS requires express language in the deed or account documentation. A deed that names two owners without specifying “joint tenants with right of survivorship” or “JTWROS” creates a tenancy in common instead. This is one of the most common titling errors in Florida real estate.

No Creditor Protection

Joint tenancy with right of survivorship provides no asset protection whatsoever. A creditor holding a judgment against one joint tenant can levy on that owner’s interest and force a sale. The purchaser at the execution sale becomes a tenant in common with the remaining co-owners, severing the joint tenancy as to the sold interest.

This vulnerability matters most when parents add an adult child to their property title as JTWROS for estate planning purposes. The child’s creditors can reach the child’s interest in the property and force a sale that displaces the parents from their home. A judgment against the child for any reason becomes a lien on the child’s interest in the parents’ property.

Severance

Any joint tenant can unilaterally sever the joint tenancy by transferring their interest to a third party or even to themselves. The transfer destroys the four unities and converts the ownership to a tenancy in common as to the transferred interest. The remaining joint tenants retain JTWROS among themselves, but the new owner holds their share as a tenant in common without survivorship rights.

This ability to sever without the consent or even the knowledge of the other co-owners is a significant risk. One joint tenant can secretly convey their interest, destroying the survivorship arrangement the other owners rely on for estate planning.

Tenants by the Entirety

Tenancy by the entirety is a form of joint ownership available exclusively to married couples. It shares the survivorship feature of JTWROS but adds two characteristics that make it far more protective: neither spouse can unilaterally transfer or encumber the property, and creditors of only one spouse cannot reach the property at all.

The legal theory behind tenancy by the entirety treats the married couple as a single owner rather than two individuals with separate interests. Neither spouse owns a divisible half. Instead, each spouse owns the entire property simultaneously with the other. Because no individual interest exists, there is nothing for a creditor of one spouse to attach.

Creation Requirements: The Six Unities

In addition to the four unities required for JTWROS (time, title, interest, and possession), tenancy by the entirety requires two additional unities: marriage and survivorship. The couple must be legally married at the time they acquire the property, and the ownership must include automatic survivorship.

For real estate, Florida presumes that property acquired jointly by a married couple is held as tenants by the entirety. For bank accounts, Florida Statutes Section 655.79 creates a statutory presumption that a joint account held by spouses is tenancy by the entirety unless otherwise specified in writing. For other personal property, the couple must demonstrate their intent to hold the property as tenants by the entirety.

The Section 689.11 Exception for Deeds Between Spouses

One important exception to the unity of time requirement applies to real property. Under Florida Statutes Section 689.11, when one spouse owns property individually and conveys it by deed to both spouses, the conveyance creates a valid tenancy by the entirety. Before this statute existed, a spouse who wanted to convert individually owned property to entireties ownership had to use an intervening third-party conveyance. The spouse would deed the property to an unrelated person, who would then deed it back to both spouses jointly. Section 689.11 eliminated that awkward workaround.

This exception applies only to real property. For financial accounts, the Florida Supreme Court’s December 2025 decision in Loumpos v. Bank One addressed a similar question and held that adding a spouse to an existing bank account is sufficient to create tenancy by the entirety, effectively extending the same principle to financial accounts.

Complete Creditor Protection

In Florida, property held as tenants by the entirety is completely immune from the creditors of either individual spouse. A judgment creditor of only one spouse cannot lien, attach, levy on, or force the sale of entireties property. The creditor has no remedy against the property during both spouses’ lifetimes and must wait until the tenancy terminates through divorce or death.

This protection applies to real estate, bank accounts, brokerage accounts, vehicles, tax refunds, LLC membership interests, and virtually any other asset that married couples can jointly title. The Tenants by the Entirety article provides a complete overview of how Florida applies this doctrine across all property types.

The protection has two important limits. First, creditors who hold judgments against both spouses jointly can reach entireties property. Creditors are aware of this and routinely require both spousal signatures on contracts and guarantees specifically to defeat entireties protection. Second, federal tax liens can attach to entireties property under the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Craft, 535 U.S. 274 (2002), regardless of state law protections. The How IRS Liens and Federal Creditors Affect Tenancy by the Entirety article examines this exception in detail.

Comparing the Three Ownership Types

The following table summarizes the key differences among Florida’s three joint ownership forms.

Feature	Tenants in Common	Joint Tenants with Right of Survivorship	Tenants by the Entirety
Who can use it	Any co-owners	Any co-owners	Married couples only
Equal shares required	No	Yes	Yes (each owns 100%)
Survivorship	No	Yes	Yes
Probate required at death	Yes	No	No
Unilateral transfer allowed	Yes	Yes (severs tenancy)	No
Creditor protection	None	None	Complete (individual creditors)
Default in Florida	Yes (Section 689.15)	No (must be express)	Yes for married couples’ real property
Can be severed by one owner	Yes (partition)	Yes (conveyance)	No (requires both spouses)

Why Married Couples Should Almost Always Choose Tenancy by the Entirety

For married couples in Florida, tenancy by the entirety is superior to both alternatives in nearly every scenario. It provides the same probate avoidance as JTWROS while adding complete creditor protection that JTWROS lacks entirely. It prevents either spouse from unilaterally transferring or encumbering the property, protecting both spouses from impulsive or fraudulent transactions.

The only situation where a married couple might intentionally choose JTWROS over tenancy by the entirety is when they want to own property jointly with a non-spouse, such as adding an adult child to a deed. In that case, tenancy by the entirety is unavailable because not all owners are married to each other. Even then, adding a non-spouse co-owner raises serious asset protection and homestead concerns that require careful analysis.

Common Errors That Create the Wrong Ownership Type

The most frequent mistake occurs when married couples open bank or brokerage accounts and select “joint with right of survivorship” or “JTWROS” on the account application instead of “tenants by the entirety.” The selection looks like a mere formality, but it determines whether the account receives creditor protection. The Common Mistakes That Destroy Tenancy by the Entirety Protection article catalogs these errors and explains how to avoid them.

Another common error involves deeds. When a couple purchases a home, the closing agent prepares the deed. If the deed says “husband and wife” or “as joint tenants with right of survivorship” instead of “as tenants by the entirety,” the couple may not receive the ownership form they assumed they had. Florida’s presumption in favor of entireties ownership for married couples provides a safety net in many cases, but relying on a presumption rather than express language invites litigation.

What Happens When Joint Ownership Ends

Each form of joint ownership terminates differently, and the consequences of termination vary.

Tenancy in common ends when one co-owner buys out the others, when the co-owners agree to sell the property, or when a court orders partition. A partition action can be filed by any tenant in common at any time, and the court will either physically divide the property (partition in kind) or order it sold and the proceeds divided (partition by sale).

Joint tenancy with right of survivorship ends when a joint tenant conveys their interest (severing the tenancy as to that share), when all surviving owners agree to terminate, or when one owner dies and only one survivor remains. Divorce between married JTWROS owners converts their ownership to tenancy in common under Section 689.15.

Tenancy by the entirety ends only upon divorce, death of either spouse, or the joint agreement of both spouses to convey or encumber the property. Divorce automatically converts tenancy by the entirety to tenancy in common, eliminating both the survivorship feature and the creditor protection. The death of either spouse vests full ownership in the survivor by operation of law, bypassing probate entirely.