Brown v. McKay

Citations

• 125 Cal. 291
• 57 P. 1001
• 1899 Cal. LEXIS 851

Syllabus

<p>Tenancy in Common—Adverse Possession—Hostile Intent—In order to establish adverse possession by a tenant in common against his cotenants, clear and unequivocal proof is required of hostile intent on his part manifested to oust the cotenants.</p> <p>Id.—Presumptions—Father and Sons as Cotenants.—All presumptions of law, of fact, and of good morals are against an adverse holding by a father who became tenant in common with his sons as heirs of the deceased wife and mother, and who recognized their title by becoming guardian of their estate and maintained friendly relations with them until death, and devised his interest to them in one parcel of the inherited realty.</p> <p>Id.—Unsettled Guardianship—Lease—Insufficient Proof of Adverse Holding.—The mere facts, in such case, that the guardianship was never settled, and that the father executed a lease to one of the sons after he became of age, of another parcel of the inherited realty, which does not appear to have been devised by the father, are insufficient to evince a hostile intent as to such parcel, or to establish an adverse holding thereof by the father as against the sons.</p>