Yessenia Damas, Respondent, v. William J. Biggs, Appellant, and Netherland Gardens Corp., Respondent, et al., Defendant

Yessenia Damas, Respondent, v William J. Biggs, Appellant, and Netherland Gardens Corp., Respondent, et al., Defendant. [66 NYS3d 130] [MAJORITY] Order and interlocutory judgment (one paper), Supreme Court, Bronx County (Larry S. Schachner, J.), entered on or about August 2, 2016, among other things, appointing a referee to conduct a sale of property and distribute the proceeds, unanimously affirmed, without costs. Given that the parties could not reach a settlement agreement, and physical partition would cause great prejudice to both owners, the motion court correctly directed that the cooperative unit be sold and the proceeds divided (RPAPL 915; see Estate of Steingart v Hoffman, 33 AD3d 465, 466 [1st Dept 2006]). Shares to a cooperative unit may be partitioned under RPAPL article 9 (Chiang v Chang, 137 AD2d 371 [1st Dept 1988]). Further, it is undisputed that plaintiff signed the proprietary lease and was a co-owner of shares to the unit; thus, she had a right to seek partition of the unit (see id.; see also RPAPL 901 [1]). To the extent defendant co-owner of the unit raises any arguments concerning the proper division of the sales proceeds, such arguments are premature. Concur—Renwick, J.P., Manzanet-Daniels, Gische, Kahn and Singh, JJ.