Somerset County Transfer on Death Deed (Tenant in Common, Individual Ownership Interest) Form

A Maryland owner who holds an undivided interest as a tenant in common can name who receives that interest at death without touching the co-owners' shares. This form prepares that transfer on death deed under the Maryland Transfer-on-Death Deed Act, Real Property Article, Title 14, Subtitle 10, for one tenant in common signing alone as to that owner's own fractional interest.

An undivided interest that passes at its owner's own death

The Act draws a line that decides when a Maryland TOD deed operates. Section 14-1001 defines a joint owner as an individual who holds concurrently with others with a right of survivorship, a joint tenant or a tenant by the entirety, and subsection (d)(3) states that a joint owner does not include a tenant in common. For joint owners, Section 14-1009 postpones the deed to the death of the last surviving joint owner. A tenant in common stands outside that rule: there is no survivorship to wait for, a tenant in common's undivided share is already separately devisable and conveyable (tenancy in common being the default form for unmarried co-grantees under Real Property Section 2-117), and the deed transfers that share at the signing owner's own death to the beneficiary who survives. The deed recites that configuration in Section 1 and carries the statutory form's operative sentence word for word.

What the co-owners keep

Section 14-1007(1) provides that during the transferor's life the deed does not affect an interest or right of the transferor or any other owner, including the right to transfer or encumber the property. The other tenants in common do not sign, are not parties, and keep every right in their own shares; the deed says so in its own text. A beneficiary takes that undivided interest as a new tenant in common beside the existing co-owners, subject to every encumbrance then of record and without covenant or warranty of title, under Section 14-1009(b) and (c).

Patterns that hold a fractional interest

Tenancy in common is the Maryland default for a grant to two or more unmarried persons whose deed carries no survivorship wording, and the record shows it among heirs who took a parent's house together, relatives or friends who bought without survivorship language, former spouses whose entireties title became a tenancy in common on absolute divorce, and an individual who holds a fraction beside a trust or a company. A married owner who holds the fractional interest alone signs alone: Maryland recognizes no community property and no dower or curtesy, so a spouse who is not a record owner has no signature line, and the surviving spouse's elective share applies to the deed under Section 14-1009(a)(1)(ii).

One owner, one signature, one certificate

The form recites exactly one owner holding an undivided interest as a tenant in common and carries one owner signature block with the (SEAL) notation of the statutory form, one acknowledgment certificate in the State Government Section 18-216(b) short form, and the certification of preparation that Section 3-104(f) makes a recording condition, printed as the two statutory alternatives for an attorney or a party with a signature line for the certifier. It is not set up for two or more owners on one instrument, for an owner who holds with a right of survivorship, for a sole owner of the whole parcel, or for a trustee, entity, or attorney-in-fact signing in a representative capacity. The beneficiary sections receive a natural person, a trust through its trustee, or an entity, with an optional alternate, and the form prints the Act's note that multiple beneficiaries take as joint tenants with rights of survivorship where the deed indicates no other form of ownership.

Recording before death, with the intake sheet

Under Section 14-1006 the deed is effective only if recorded before the owner's death in the land records of the county, or Baltimore City, where the property lies, and the form carries the statutory notice to that effect at its head. The Act lets a clerk refuse a TOD deed that arrives without a Land Instrument Intake Sheet, and it exempts a deed of the owner's primary or secondary residence from recordation tax and from State and county transfer tax.

The package includes the fillable transfer on death deed as a PDF, a completed example filled in for a Baltimore County owner of an undivided one-half interest, and a plain-language guide that walks through each numbered section, the intake sheet, and the tax exemptions. The materials are informational and are not legal advice.