To get a name off a deed when you are not married to your co-owner, the departing owner signs a quitclaim deed handing their ownership interest over to you, and you record it with the county. That part is straightforward. The complication sits on the other side of the closing table: taking a name off the deed does nothing to the mortgage, and the transfer itself can give your lender the legal right to demand the full loan balance. Both pieces have to be handled together.
Start With a Quitclaim Deed
When both co-owners agree on the transfer, a quitclaim deed is the standard tool. The departing owner (the grantor) signs over whatever ownership interest they hold to the remaining owner (the grantee). A quitclaim deed makes no promises about whether the title is clean or whether anyone else has a claim to the property. It simply hands over the grantor’s interest, whatever that turns out to be.
That lack of guarantees is why quitclaim deeds are used almost exclusively between people who already know each other. A stranger buying a house would insist on a warranty deed with legal protections if title problems surface later. Between co-owners sorting out shared property, a quitclaim deed is the practical choice because both parties already know the title history.
Before you sign anything, pull up the current deed and look at how ownership is described. If you hold the property as tenants in common, each owner can hold a different-sized share, so a buyout has to account for the actual percentages. Joint tenancy with right of survivorship requires equal shares. Knowing which you have tells you what interest is really being transferred.
Prepare, Sign, and Record the Deed
Drafting the deed requires a few pieces of information: the full legal names of the grantor and grantee, the county and state where the property sits, and the property’s legal description. The legal description is the formal boundary language from the existing deed, not the street address. Copy it exactly, character for character. Even small discrepancies between the old and new deed can create problems down the road.
Blank quitclaim deed forms are available from county recorder offices, and many states make their own versions available online. Once completed, the grantor signs the deed in front of a notary public. A handful of states also require one or two witnesses to sign alongside the notary, so check your state’s requirements before scheduling the signing. The notary verifies the grantor’s identity and applies their official seal.
After signing, file the deed at the county recorder’s or clerk’s office where the property is located. Recording makes the ownership change part of the public record. Expect to pay a recording fee, which varies by county but generally falls somewhere between $10 and $110. Some states and localities also charge a transfer tax calculated as a percentage of the property’s value, though many exempt transfers between co-owners or transfers where no money changes hands. Call your county recorder’s office ahead of time to confirm the exact fees and any exemptions that apply.
The Mortgage Does Not Come Off With the Name
This is the part that trips people up most often. The deed and the mortgage are two separate legal documents. The deed says who owns the property. The mortgage says who owes the bank money. If both co-owners signed the mortgage, the departing owner stays fully responsible for the debt even after their name comes off the deed.
If the remaining owner later stops making payments, the lender can still pursue the person who signed away their ownership. They gave up their stake in the property but kept the financial obligation, which is the worst possible combination.
Refinance or Loan Assumption
The clean solution is for the remaining owner to refinance the mortgage into their name alone. Refinancing pays off the original joint loan and replaces it with a new one that only the remaining owner is responsible for. The catch is that the remaining owner has to qualify on their own income and credit, which is not always possible when a household drops from two incomes to one.
If the mortgage is an FHA-insured loan, there is another route. All FHA single-family forward mortgages are assumable, meaning a qualifying borrower can take over the existing loan terms rather than refinancing from scratch.1U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Are FHA-Insured Mortgages Assumable? The departing owner can be released from personal liability once the assuming borrower meets HUD’s creditworthiness requirements. VA loans are also assumable under certain conditions. Conventional loans typically are not.
The Due-on-Sale Clause
Most mortgages contain a due-on-sale clause that lets the lender demand full repayment of the loan balance if ownership of the property changes hands. Federal law carves out exemptions for certain transfers, including transfers between spouses, transfers resulting from divorce, and transfers after a borrower’s death.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 12 U.S. Code 1701j-3 – Preemption of Due-on-Sale Prohibitions Notice what is missing from that list: transfers between unmarried co-owners.
A quitclaim deed from one unmarried co-owner to another is technically the kind of ownership change that can trigger the clause. In practice, many lenders do not enforce it as long as payments keep arriving on time, because their concern is financial risk rather than whose name is on the deed. But they have the legal right to call the loan due, and if they do, you would need to pay the full remaining balance or face foreclosure. Talk to your lender before recording the deed, or time the deed transfer to happen simultaneously with a refinance closing.
Tax Consequences You Have to Plan For
Transferring a property interest without receiving fair market value in return is treated as a gift for federal tax purposes. If the value of the interest being given away exceeds $19,000 in 2026, the person making the gift must file IRS Form 709 (the gift tax return) by April 15 of the following year, even if no gift tax is actually owed.3Internal Revenue Service. What’s New – Estate and Gift Tax Most people will not owe tax because the lifetime gift and estate tax exemption absorbs it, but skipping the filing itself can create problems later.
If the departing owner is being bought out at fair market value, gift tax is not the concern. Instead, the departing owner may owe capital gains tax on any profit they realize from the sale of their ownership share.
The Carryover Basis Trap
When property is received as a gift, the recipient inherits the donor’s original cost basis rather than getting a new basis at current market value.4Internal Revenue Service. Property (Basis, Sale of Home, etc.) This is called carryover basis, and it can cost you real money years later when you sell. If the two of you originally bought the house for $200,000 and the departing owner gifts you their half, your basis in that half stays at $100,000 rather than stepping up to what the half is worth today. When you eventually sell, you will owe capital gains tax on all the appreciation since the original purchase, not just appreciation since the transfer.
Compare that to a buyout. If you pay fair market value for the departing owner’s share, your basis in that portion resets to the purchase price. The difference in tax owed at sale can be significant on property that has appreciated substantially.
Liens and Title Insurance Travel With the Deed
A quitclaim deed transfers whatever interest the grantor holds, including any baggage attached to it. If the departing owner has a judgment lien, tax lien, or other encumbrance recorded against the property, that lien generally survives the transfer. You do not get a fresh start just because the deed is in your name alone now.
Run a title search before accepting the deed. A search will reveal liens, unpaid taxes, and other claims against the property. If the departing owner has creditor problems you do not know about, you want to find out before the transfer rather than after.
Existing title insurance policies typically do not transfer to a new owner after a quitclaim deed. If you had a joint owner’s title insurance policy, the coverage may no longer protect you as the sole owner. A new owner’s title insurance policy is worth considering, though some insurers are reluctant to write policies on quitclaim transfers precisely because no warranties come with the deed.
When the Other Co-Owner Will Not Sign
If the other co-owner refuses to sign a quitclaim deed, you cannot simply remove their name. The legal option is a partition action, a lawsuit asking a court to divide or force the sale of jointly owned property. Any co-owner can file one regardless of how small their ownership share is, and the right to partition is generally considered absolute unless all co-owners previously agreed to waive it in a binding contract.
Courts resolve partition three ways:
- Partition in kind, where the court physically divides the property. This works for vacant land but is essentially impossible for a single house.
- Partition by sale, where the court orders the property sold and divides the proceeds by ownership share. This is the most common outcome for residential property.
- Partition by appraisal, where the court orders one co-owner to buy out the other at an appraised fair market value. Some states have adopted this as a preferred alternative to forced sale, particularly under the Uniform Partition of Heirs Property Act.
Partition cases typically take one to two years from filing to resolution. Attorney fees are significant, and while they are sometimes recoverable from the sale proceeds, expect to pay costs upfront. A co-owner who has contributed more than their share to mortgage payments, property taxes, or improvements may be able to claim credit for those contributions when proceeds are divided, so keep records of every payment you have made.
Before filing, offer a direct buyout at fair market value in writing. A written offer is cheaper than litigation, and in some states the court will want to see evidence that you gave the other co-owner a chance to sell voluntarily before ordering a forced sale.