Donation between co-owners

The Supreme Court published on 24 May 2017 the judgment No. 30 Cdo 5799/2016, which contains interesting findings concerning the right of co-ownership of real estate.

Firstly, the Court confirmed its previous opinion also for the new Civil Code, that when the co-ownership is annulled, all co-owners must appear as parties in the court proceedings.

Furthermore, it is stated that a donation contract between the co-owners, the result of which is the sole ownership of one of them, is permissible. In this way, the objection is rejected that for this purpose, only the special contract for the annulment of co-ownership provided by the law can be used. According to the opinion of the Supreme Court, such an opinion is a too strict application of the conditions for the nullity of legal transactions, which cannot be satisfactorily justified in today's private law.