Joint Tenancy vs. Tenants in Common in the NWT: What Happens to the House

The single question that decides whether settling the house is a quick afternoon or a months-long court process is how the title was held. If your late spouse or parent owned the home with someone else "in joint tenancy," the property may already be yours — no probate, no court, a flat $30 at the Land Titles Office. If it was held "as tenants in common," or in the deceased's name alone, you're looking at probate and a more involved transfer. Most people don't know which one applies until they pull the title.

So start there: get a copy of the Certificate of Title from the NWT Land Titles Office. The NWT uses the Torrens system, meaning the government guarantees the accuracy of the registered title — what the title says is what's legally true. The title will state how the owners held the property. Everything else follows from that one line.

Joint Tenancy: The House Passes Automatically

Joint tenancy carries the right of survivorship. When one joint tenant dies, their interest doesn't form part of their estate at all — it passes, automatically and by operation of law, to the surviving joint tenant(s). It doesn't go through the will. It doesn't go through probate. The deceased's executor has no role in it.

This is why a surviving spouse who owned the home jointly with the deceased usually keeps the house with minimal friction. The property was never the estate's to distribute.

To update the title into the survivor's sole name, you file a survivorship transfer at the Land Titles Office. The cost is a flat $30 — not a percentage of the home's value, just $30. You'll typically need:

• A copy of the death certificate.
• A statutory declaration confirming the death and the survivorship (the NWT requires a statutory declaration for the transfer).
• The transfer/survivorship form prescribed by Land Titles.

One detail worth flagging: NWT Land Titles does not put combined names on a single transfer form — the paperwork moves the title cleanly from joint ownership into the survivor's name. And because the territory does not allow virtual or remote commissioning of affidavits or statutory declarations, you'll need to sign the declaration in person before a Commissioner for Oaths.

That's the whole process. No grant of probate, no probate fee, no court application. If the title says joint tenancy, this is your path.

Tenants in Common: The Share Goes Through the Estate

Tenants in common is the opposite. Each owner holds a distinct, separate share — often but not always equal — and there is no right of survivorship. When a tenant in common dies, their share doesn't go to the co-owner. It becomes part of their estate and passes under their will (or under intestacy rules if there's no will).

That means the deceased's share has to be probated before it can be transferred. The executor applies for a Grant of Probate from the Supreme Court of the NWT — Form 6 (Application), Form 7 (Affidavit in Support), and the supporting Schedules (Forms 8–13) — at a registry in Yellowknife, Hay River, or Inuvik. Once the grant issues, the executor can transfer the deceased's share to whoever inherits it under the will.

The Land Titles transfer here is a transmission, not a survivorship transfer, and it's priced differently: $2 per $1,000 of the value being transferred, with a $100 minimum. So a $300,000 share would cost roughly $600 to register, versus the flat $30 for a survivorship transfer. The co-owner keeps their own share untouched; only the deceased's portion moves.

If you're not certain which kind of ownership applies, or the title wording is ambiguous, it's worth getting the full picture before you file anything. The Northwest Territories probate guide explains how to read the Certificate of Title, which transfer route each ownership type triggers, and the exact Land Titles fees — so you don't pay for probate you didn't need, or skip probate you did.

What If There Was No Will?

If the property went through the estate (tenants in common, or sole ownership) and the deceased left no will, the share is distributed under NWT intestacy rules — and these surprise a lot of surviving spouses. The preferential share for a surviving spouse on intestacy in the NWT is only $50,000, or the matrimonial home, before the rest is divided with children. So a surviving spouse who assumed they'd automatically get the whole house may find they share it with the children if the home wasn't held jointly and there's no will.

This is exactly why joint tenancy matters so much for couples: it sidesteps both probate and the intestacy split. If the home was jointly held, none of the intestacy math applies — the survivor takes it by right of survivorship regardless of whether there was a will.

A few related points the title check will also surface:

• Customary and customary-adoption heirs. Under the Aboriginal Custom Adoption Recognition Act, children adopted by Aboriginal custom have full inheritance rights — they count as children for distribution purposes.
• Indian Act land. If the property is on reserve or otherwise governed by the Indian Act, the estate is administered through CIRNAC in the NWT (not ISC as in southern provinces), and the Land Titles process described here may not apply.
• Minor or absent heirs. If a beneficiary is a minor, or no next of kin can be found after a diligent search, the Public Trustee may step in.

Pull the Title First, Then Act

Almost every wrong turn in handling NWT estate property comes from guessing at the ownership type instead of confirming it. A surviving spouse who assumes the house is "theirs" and finds out it was tenants in common can lose weeks; an executor who starts a probate application for a property that actually passed by survivorship wastes a filing. The Certificate of Title resolves it in one document, and the Torrens system means you can rely on what it says.

Once you know the answer, the path is short: joint tenancy means a $30 survivorship transfer with a statutory declaration; tenants in common (or sole ownership) means probate plus a transmission at $2 per $1,000. The Northwest Territories estate settlement guide gives you the title-reading checklist, both Land Titles transfer routes with current forms and fees, and the intestacy rules in plain language — everything you need to settle the house without a real estate lawyer.

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