A. The Plaintiff (Appointed Party; hereinafter “Plaintiff”) share 44/2,145 square meters of C forest land in Ansan-si (hereinafter “instant land”) at 444/2,145 shares, D’s share 58/2,145 shares, Defendant A’s share 1,141/2,145 shares, and Defendant B shares at 502/2,145 shares.

B. The Plaintiff and the designated parties D acquired each of the above shares of the instant land from among the instant land through the public sale process on March 3, 2014, and requested the Defendants to divide the instant land, but no agreement was reached between the Plaintiff, the designated parties D, and the Defendants on the method of dividing the instant land until the closing date of the instant argument.

【Ground of recognition】 The fact that there has been no dispute, entry of Gap Nos. 1 and 2, the purport of the whole pleadings

2. Determination on the cause of the claim

A. According to the facts acknowledged earlier, the Plaintiff, the co-owner of the instant land, and the designated parties D may claim the partition of the instant land against the Defendants, the other co-owners, pursuant to Article 269(1) of the Civil Act.

B. On the other hand, as to the method of partition, the partition of co-owned property in kind is in principle divided in kind, or if the value of the partition is likely to be reduced remarkably due to the division, the court may order an auction of the goods (Article 269(2) of the Civil Act). In this case, the requirement that “it may not be divided in kind” is not physically strict interpretation, but physically strict interpretation is not to include cases where it is difficult or inappropriate to divide in kind in light of the nature, location, size, use status, and use value after the division.

(1) In the case of a co-owner, "if the value of the property is to be reduced remarkably if the property is to be divided in kind" includes the case where the value of the property to be owned by the sole owner is likely to be reduced significantly than the value of the property before the division, even if the co-owner is a person.

Supreme Court Decision 2002Da4580 Delivered on April 12, 2002