Dividing Co-owned Property Through the Courts

Most co-ownership in Bulgaria starts with an inheritance. A parent leaves a flat to three children: one lives in it, one wants to sell, and the third lives abroad and rarely replies. Divorces and joint purchases produce the same deadlock. Bulgarian law resolves it with a simple principle — nobody can be kept in co-ownership against their will. If the owners cannot agree, any one of them can ask the court to divide the property.

Try an agreement first

A voluntary partition, signed by all co-owners before a notary, is almost always quicker and cheaper than litigation. Court partition is the tool for when that fails — because one co-owner refuses, cannot be found, or disputes the others’ shares. Note that not every asset can be divided by the court: some, such as inherited shares in a joint-stock company, can only be split by agreement.

Stage one: who owns what

The first stage settles two questions: who the co-owners are, and how large each share is. All of them must be parties. At the first hearing, any party can dispute another’s right to take part or the size of their share. The arguments that typically surface here are:

• that a will is invalid or must be reduced to protect a reserved share;
• that a co-owner transferred their share in exchange for care and maintenance;
• that one co-owner has become sole owner through long possession.

Once these disputes are resolved, the court gives a judgment allowing the partition. It fixes, with binding effect, the parties, the properties and each share. Those questions cannot be reopened later. If the case is stopped and later restarted, it resumes directly at stage two.

When one co-owner claims to own everything

The most contested argument at stage one is acquisitive prescription — the claim that one co-owner has possessed the whole property as their own for at least ten years and has therefore acquired the others’ shares. The answer depends heavily on how the co-ownership began.

Co-ownership not based on inheritance — for example, a joint purchase. The law presumes that a person in control of a property holds it for themselves. A co-owner who has held the entire property in a way that excluded the others only has to prove that control. It is then for the others to show that the possession was interrupted, or that it was exercised on their behalf as well.

Co-ownership created by inheritance. Here the starting point is reversed. Heirs who use the family property are presumed to do so for all the heirs together. The heir relying on prescription must prove that they did something that clearly showed the others they were now holding the property for themselves alone. Living in an inherited flat for fifteen years is not, on its own, enough.

Stage two: accounts and allocation

The second stage begins with money claims between the co-owners. The most common is reimbursement for improvements one of them has paid for; claims for use of the property are also raised. The court decides them all in a single judgment.

Court-appointed experts then value the property and assess whether it can be physically divided. On that basis, the case ends in one of four ways:

1. Division into parts

   Where there are several properties, or one that can be split, each co-owner receives a part, with cash payments to even out differences in value.

2. Allocation to one co-owner

   An indivisible home can be allocated to a co-owner who lived there when the inheritance opened and has no other home — or, for a former marital home, to the spouse who has custody of the children and no home of their own. They pay the others, with statutory interest, within six months; where several qualify, the highest offer wins.

3. Drawing lots

   Once the partition record is final, the parts are normally distributed by drawing lots; the court allocates them directly only where lots are impossible or very impractical.

4. Public sale

   Any other property that cannot be divided is sold at public auction, and the proceeds are split by share — unless all co-owners agree a buy-out.

Before you file

Gather the title documents and, for inherited property, a certificate of heirs for each deceased owner in the chain. Identify every co-owner and their address — including those abroad, who often slow the case down. And consider whether the realistic end point is an auction: properties sold at public sale often fetch less than on the open market, which is a strong argument for settling.

Questions clients ask

This guide is general information about Bulgarian law as it stood on the date of publication. It is not legal advice for your specific case.