Open Decision Ledger · Civil obligations & remedies
Divided co-ownership of shared land requires proof of location and area
Supreme Court, July 10, 2019, 2017Da253522 (judgment)
No holding summary · checked against points at issue. The official text publishes no summary of the holding for this decision. The quotation and factors in this record are copied verbatim from the points at issue; the evidence for each axis is taken from the points at issue, the order and the reasons.
Case name: 소유권이전등기
Official text on the National Law Information Center
Question
Where part of a parcel of land is transferred by specification and a co-ownership share registration is made over the whole parcel for convenience, and that specified part passes on and the share registration passes with it, does a divided co-ownership arise between the original transferor and the last assignee of the specified part, and what must a person who claims to have acquired that part by such a relationship allege and prove?
Holding
Such a co-ownership may lawfully arise only where the parties agreed to divide the property with its location and area both specified, so a person claiming that it arose must allege and prove not only the location of the land but also its area. A registered share over the whole parcel made for convenience is a valid registration of a trustee under a mutual name trust, and the status passes on with each transfer, but that alone does not establish the divided co-ownership.
Points at issue, verbatim
구분소유적 공유관계를 주장하여 특정 토지 부분을 취득했다고 주장하는 사람이 주장·증명하여야 할 내용
Unofficial English translation
the matters that must be asserted and proved by a person who claims to have acquired a specific land part by asserting a co-ownership by divided shares
Disposition
Reversed and remanded Stated in the decision
원심판결을 파기하고, 사건을 부산지방법원 합의부에 환송한다.
Unofficial English translation
The judgment of the court below is reversed, and the case is remanded to the collegiate panel of Busan District Court.
Form of the test
Elements stated Stated in the decision
구분소유적 공유관계는 부동산의 위치와 면적을 특정하여 2인 이상이 구분소유하기로 하는 약정이 있어야만 적법하게 성립할 수 있으므로
Unofficial English translation
since a co-ownership by divided shares may be validly established only where there is an agreement under which two or more persons agree to hold divided ownership by designating the location and area of the real property
Factors
- 1필의 토지의 일부를 특정하여 양도받고 편의상 그 전체에 관하여 공유지분등기가 경료된 후 특정 부분이 전전 양도되고 그에 따라 공유지분등기도 전전 경료된 경우
- 최초 양도인과 특정 부분의 최후 양수인 사이의 법률관계
- 구분소유적 공유관계를 주장하여 특정 토지 부분을 취득했다고 주장하는 사람이 주장·증명하여야 할 내용
Unofficial English translation
• Where a transferee received a transfer by designating a specific part of a single parcel of land and, for convenience, a co-ownership share registration was made with respect to the whole parcel, and thereafter the specific part was successively transferred and co-ownership share registrations were successively made accordingly
• the legal relationship between the original transferor and the last transferee of the specific part
• the matters that must be asserted and proved by a person who claims to have acquired a specific land part by asserting a co-ownership by divided shares
Relation to precedent
Follows earlier decisions Stated in the decision
대법원 2015. 2. 12. 선고 2012다103813 판결 참조
Unofficial English translation
see Supreme Court Decision 2012Da103813 decided February 12, 2015
Decisions referred to
대법원 2015. 2. 12. 선고 2012다103813 판결
Burden of proof
The party asserting Stated in the decision
구분소유적 공유관계를 주장하여 특정 토지 부분을 취득했다고 주장하는 사람은 구분소유약정의 대상이 되는 해당 토지의 위치뿐만 아니라 면적까지도 주장·증명해야 한다
Unofficial English translation
A person who claims to have acquired a specific land part by asserting a co-ownership by divided shares must assert and prove not only the location but also the area of the relevant land subject to the agreement on divided ownership
Open question and revisit condition
Where no written sales contract exists, what evidence can prove the area of the land that the parties agreed to divide?
The judgment of the remand court of the Busan District Court, Collegial Panel, once it finds or rejects the agreed area, will show how the requirement is met in practice. A change to Article 103 of the Civil Act on name trusts, or a later decision departing from Supreme Court Decision 2012Da103813, would call for this entry to be read again.
Cross-family AI independent reading & axis check
7 of 8 axes matched GPT-6 Astra (OpenAI, codex CLI) · 2026-10-25
A reader from another model family (GPT-6 Astra), given the official text but not the primary reading, agreed on 7 of the 8 axes; the readings differed on axis 5 (factors).
Axis 5 (Factors): Primary “1필의 토지의 일부를 특정하여 양도받고 편의상 그 전체에 관하여 공유지분등기가 경료된 후 특정 부분이 전전 양도되고 그에 따라 공유지분등기도 전전 경료된 경우 / 최초 양도인과 특정 부분의 최후 양수인 사이의 법률관계 / 구분소유적 공유관계를 주장하여 특정 토지 부분을 취득했다고 주장하는 사람이 주장·증명하여야 할 내용” vs Independent “1필의 토지의 일부를 특정하여 양도받고 / 편의상 그 전체에 관하여 공유지분등기가 경료된 후 / 특정 부분이 전전 양도되고 / 그에 따라 공유지분등기도 전전 경료된 경우”
The primary reading lists the fact pattern together with the legal relationship and the allegation burden, while the independent reading lists only fragments of the fact pattern and omits the location and area agreement.
1필의 토지의 일부를 특정하여 양도받고Raw responses and comparison record: Protocol · Blind readings (JSONL) · Axis comparison (JSONL) · SHA-256 (JSON)
Lower-court contrast & scope of application
Lower-court reading vs. Supreme Court holding
Lower-court context: The Busan District Court, in its judgment of 21 July 2017 (2017Na41542), held that a divided co-ownership existed among the co-owners of the lands in Busan Saha-gu, assigning to Plaintiff 1 parts marked ㉰ (91 m²) and ㉳ (317 m²), to Plaintiff 2 parts marked ㉮ (166 m²), ㉲ (119 m²) and ㉵ (3 m²), and to Defendant parts marked ㉯ (1 m²), ㉱ (83 m²) and ㉴ (539 m²). On that premise it ordered the Defendant to perform the procedure for transfer of ownership registration to the Plaintiffs over the parts they occupied, on the cause of termination of the mutual name trust.
Supreme Court standard: The Supreme Court held that the court below had misread the law on the establishment of divided co-ownership. The area corresponding to the registered shares, 154.554 m² for Plaintiff 1 and 269.711 m² for Plaintiff 2, differed markedly from the occupied areas of 408 m² and 288 m², and the Plaintiffs produced no objective evidence such as a sales contract. Given also that Plaintiff 1 acquired the share some five years after registering the house, that Plaintiff 2's share had been divided among four people before 5 August 2011, two of whom did not own the houses, and that the Defendant had charged use compensation for the excess occupancy, and Plaintiff 1 paid it without raising any objection, the divided co-ownership the Plaintiffs asserted was not proved, and the judgment was reversed and remanded.
Distinguishing conditions
- A case in which a sales contract or other objective evidence identifies the land purchased by specification, both its location and its area, so that the party's own proof meets the requirement the Court stated.
- A case in which the area occupied corresponds to the area corresponding to the registered share, so that the discrepancy the Court relied on is absent.
- A case in which the parties never agreed to divide the property with its location and area both specified, since the Court made such an agreement a requirement of lawful divided co-ownership.
Record verification notes
Set the occupied areas against the area corresponding to the registered share of each person on the register, and gather whatever written material identifies the part purchased by specification. Then trace the history of each share, since the Court noted that Plaintiff 2's share was held by four people before 5 August 2011, two of whom did not own the houses on the land, and look at any use compensation charged for excess occupancy and whether it was contested.
From the official text
Points at issue
1필의 토지의 일부를 특정하여 양도받고 편의상 그 전체에 관하여 공유지분등기가 경료된 후 특정 부분이 전전 양도되고 그에 따라 공유지분등기도 전전 경료된 경우, 최초 양도인과 특정 부분의 최후 양수인 사이의 법률관계 및 구분소유적 공유관계를 주장하여 특정 토지 부분을 취득했다고 주장하는 사람이 주장·증명하여야 할 내용
Unofficial English translation
Where a transferee received a transfer by designating a specific part of a single parcel of land and, for convenience, a co-ownership share registration was made with respect to the whole parcel, and thereafter the specific part was successively transferred and co-ownership share registrations were successively made accordingly, the legal relationship between the original transferor and the last transferee of the specific part, and the matters that must be asserted and proved by a person who claims to have acquired a specific land part by asserting a co-ownership by divided shares
Summary of the holding
The official text publishes no summary of the holding for this decision. The quotation and factors in this record are copied verbatim from the points at issue; the evidence for each axis is taken from the points at issue, the order and the reasons.
Order
원심판결을 파기하고, 사건을 부산지방법원 합의부에 환송한다.
Unofficial English translation
The judgment of the court below is reversed, and the case is remanded to the collegiate panel of Busan District Court.
Provisions referred to
민법 제103조[명의신탁], 민사소송법 제288조
Read 2026-10-25 · Cross-read 2026-10-25. All quotes matched against the official text. The Chinese-character placeholders the court used for anonymised parties are given in their Korean readings, and parenthetical Chinese-character glosses are omitted.
Every entry is published only after all quotes have been matched character by character against the official text, and audited by an independent second reading from a different model family across all eight axes. Both agreed axes and text-grounded interpretive divergences are recorded openly. The ledger is a research record, not an assessment of the court or advice on any matter.
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