Unmarried Couples and Home Ownership in Colorado

How you take title decides what happens if one of you dies, leaves, or wants out. Colorado picks a default, and it is probably not the one you assumed.

Unmarried partners can buy a home together in Colorado without any special arrangement. Nothing in the law requires marriage, and lenders and title companies handle these purchases routinely.

What takes planning is the part nobody wants to discuss at closing. Two people who own a house together need to know what happens if one dies, one wants out, or the relationship ends, and the deed is where those answers live.

First, a Myth Worth Clearing Up

Colorado is not a community property state. It is an equitable distribution state, and married couples here do not hold a special form of title.¹ When a marriage ends, a court divides marital property in a way it finds fair rather than splitting everything down the middle.

That matters for this page because it changes the real comparison. A married couple takes title the same ways an unmarried couple does, through the same deeds and the same forms of co-ownership.

What marriage changes is not the deed but the court’s power. On divorce, a court can divide property under the Colorado property division statutes regardless of whose name is on the title. Unmarried partners have no equivalent statutory division, which is why what you put in writing matters more.

Colorado’s Default Is Tenancy in Common

If two people take title together and the deed says nothing more, they hold as tenants in common. A conveyance to two or more natural persons does not create a joint tenancy unless the instrument declares it.² The words that do it are in joint tenancy, as joint tenants, or the abbreviation JTWROS.

As tenants in common, each of you owns a share. Those shares do not have to be equal, so a partner who puts in more of the down payment can hold a larger percentage if the deed says so. If the deed does not say otherwise, the shares are presumed equal.

Two consequences follow, and both surprise people. Either of you can sell, give away, or mortgage your share without the other’s consent. And if one of you dies, your share does not automatically go to your partner.

It goes wherever your will sends it, which can be to your partner if that is what you wrote. With no will, it passes under Colorado’s intestacy rules to your relatives, which can leave your partner owning a house with your family.

Colorado built a tool for exactly this situation, and most couples have never heard of it. Two unmarried adults can record a designated beneficiary agreement giving each other the right to inherit through intestate succession.³ A designated beneficiary takes the entire intestate estate where no descendants survive, or half of it where descendants do.

The agreement has to be properly executed and recorded with the county clerk and recorder, and it yields to a conflicting will or other superseding document. It is a backstop rather than a substitute for an estate plan.

One more feature is worth knowing. The statute says that nothing in it creates evidence of an intent to form a common-law marriage. Signing one does not push you toward the question raised later on this page.

Joint Tenancy, and the Thing That Undoes It

Joint tenancy is the alternative, and survivorship is the point of it. If one joint tenant dies, their interest passes to the surviving joint tenant without going through the estate.

Interests in a Colorado joint tenancy may be equal or unequal, and they are presumed equal unless the instrument says otherwise. That is a Colorado-specific rule, so advice written for other states may tell you the shares must be identical.

Here is what the usual explanation leaves out. A joint tenant can sever the joint tenancy alone, subject to narrow exceptions. They do it by executing and recording an instrument conveying their interest to themselves as a tenant in common, and it takes effect on recording.

No notice to you is required for that to work. Survivorship protects you only for as long as the other person leaves it in place, which is why a deed is a starting point rather than a plan.

Buying together, or trying to untangle a house you already share?

The deed, the estate plan, and any written agreement between you have to point the same direction. Schedule a free consultation with Johnson Law Group and we will look at how the property is held and what it would take to change it.

Changing From One to the Other

Switching between tenancy in common and joint tenancy is possible, and it is a recording question rather than a conversation. It takes a new deed with the right statutory language, signed and recorded.

Colorado allows an owner to be both the grantor and the grantee for this purpose, so the mechanics are simpler than they sound. The care goes into getting the language right, because the wrong words leave you with the default.

A lender with a mortgage on the property may also have something to say about a change in title. That is worth checking before the deed is drafted rather than after it is recorded.

What Happens If You Split Up

This is the question the house actually raises, and it has a specific answer. A cotenant who wants out and cannot reach agreement can bring a partition action.⁴ A court can order the property divided or, far more often with a single home, sold with the proceeds distributed.

Partition is a blunt instrument and an expensive one. It can end with the house sold on a court timetable rather than on terms you chose, which is why a written agreement is worth having first.

That is the argument for writing something down at the start. A co-ownership agreement can set out who pays what and what happens if one of you wants to leave. It can also give the other a chance to buy, and say how the price is determined.

None of that is unusual or pessimistic. It is the same thinking that goes into any agreement between two people who share an asset.

Could You Already Be Married? Common-Law Marriage in Colorado

Colorado is one of the few states that still recognizes common-law marriage, and buying a house together is exactly the kind of fact that puts the question on the table. The Colorado Supreme Court has held that it takes a mutual agreement to enter the legal and social institution of marriage, followed by conduct manifesting that agreement.⁵

That case is a useful illustration here. The couple in it owned property together, held joint bank and credit card accounts, and worked with a financial advisor as a couple. The court still found no common-law marriage, because the evidence did not show the intent was mutual.

So a shared house is evidence, not an answer. So are holding yourselves out as a couple, filing taxes jointly, and naming each other on accounts and deeds, and a court weighs the whole picture rather than a checklist.

Signed paperwork does not settle it either. In 2026 the Court of Appeals affirmed that a couple who signed an affidavit of common-law marriage were not married, because they lacked mutual intent when they signed it.⁶

An affidavit is evidence rather than proof. What proof Colorado courts actually need comes down to is conduct across the whole relationship.

If a court does find a common-law marriage, everything on this page changes. The house becomes part of a marital estate divided in a Colorado divorce, rather than a co-ownership dispute resolved by partition.

That cuts both ways, and which way it cuts depends on your situation. It is worth knowing which conversation you are in before you need the answer.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can an unmarried couple buy a house together in Colorado?

Yes, and nothing special is required. What takes thought is how you take title, because the deed decides what happens if one of you dies, wants out, or sells a share. Colorado applies a default if the deed is silent.

What happens if the deed does not say anything about how we hold title?

You hold as tenants in common, with shares presumed equal unless the deed says otherwise. Either of you can transfer your share without the other’s consent. A deceased partner’s share passes under their will, or under intestacy if there is no will, rather than to you automatically.

Will my partner automatically inherit my share under joint tenancy?

Only while the joint tenancy is intact. A joint tenant can sever it alone by recording a conveyance of their interest to themselves as a tenant in common. That ends survivorship from the moment it is recorded, and requires no notice to you.

What can I do if we break up and cannot agree about the house?

A cotenant can bring a partition action, and a court can order the property divided or sold with the proceeds distributed. It is expensive and the outcome is usually a sale on the court’s timetable, which is why a written co-ownership agreement is worth having first.

Could we already be married without realizing it?

Possibly. Colorado recognizes common-law marriage, and it turns on whether you mutually agreed to enter the institution of marriage rather than on how long you lived together. Owning a home together is evidence, and so is a signed affidavit, but neither settles it on its own.

Talk With a Colorado Attorney

The deed, your estate plan, and anything you sign between you need to say the same thing. Most of the trouble in these cases comes from documents that were each sensible on their own and were never read together.

Johnson Law Group works with couples across the state on property and family matters, and you can learn more about our approach on our Colorado family law page. You can find our offices in Denver, Colorado Springs, Commerce City, Englewood, and Fort Collins. You can also read about the background and experience of the attorneys on our team.

Schedule a free consultation and we will help you set this up so it holds.

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