“The case law generally favours an order for partition and sale of a home by a cotenant unless the opposing party can demonstrate prejudice. The onus is generally on the party resisting the sale to show prejudice, and that has been defined as being malicious, vexatious or oppressive conduct by the moving party seeking the sale. That type of conduct is essentially bad faith conduct involving some sort of hidden agenda or purpose connected to the request for a sale of the property: see Akman v. Burshtein, [2009] O.J. No. 1499 (S.C.J.) at para. 38. The standard of malicious, vexatious or oppressive conduct has been confirmed by the Court of Appeal in Latcham v. Latcham (2002), 27 R.F.L. (5th) 358 (Ont. C.A.) where the court confirmed the high threshold required to resist the sale of a home as follows [at para. 2]:
That standard, as the Divisional Court noted, was reaffirmed by this court in Silva v. Silva (1990), 1 O.R. (3d) 436 (Ont. C.A.) and requires malicious, vexatious or oppressive conduct. This narrow standard for the exercise of discretion flows from a joint owner’s prima facie right to partition.”