O.C.G.A. § 44-5-84 (2019)
Presumption of gift arising from delivery of personalty by parent to child living separate from parent
The delivery of personal property by a parent into the exclusive possession of a child living separate from the parent creates a presumption of a gift to the child. This presumption may be rebutted by evidence of an actual contract of lending or by circumstances from which such a contract may be inferred.
History
(Orig. Code 1863, § 2621; Code 1868, § 2621; Code 1873, § 2663; Code 1882, § 2663; Civil Code 1895, § 3570; Civil Code 1910, § 4150; Code 1933, § 48-105.)
Annotations
JUDICIAL DECISIONS Statute applies only if there is a delivery, or if the donee is in actual possession. Lanier v. Holt, 18 Ga. App. 185, 89 S.E. 182 (1916). See also Hawkins v. Davie, 136 Ga. 550, 71 S.E. 873 (1911) (see O.C.G.A. § 44-5-84). Presumption of gift applied. - When a father permits property to go home with his daughter, immediately upon her marriage or at any subsequent period, if he suffer it to remain there for a number of years, the presumption of law is that he intended it as a gift. Butler v. Hughes, 35 Ga. 200 (1866). Presumption rebutted by proof that chattel held as loan. - Presumption that the law raises in favor of a gift, when made by a parent to a child, when the recipient is allowed to retain in the recipient’s possession a chattel, is completely overcome and destroyed in the absence of other proof, by the declarations of such recipient, that the recipient held the chattel as a loan, and not as a gift - that the title to the property was in the parent. Culbreath v. Patton, 73 Ga. App. 667, 37 S.E.2d 719 (1946). Presumption of gift not rebutted by evidence. - Check from parents, who formed a limited partnership, given to their child for a
large sum, was properly determined to have been a gift from the parents pursuant to O.C.G.A. §§ 44-5-80 and 44-5-84, rather than a loan; the presumption under O.C.G.A. § 44-5-84, together with other supportive circumstantial evidence, including that there was no contract or lending and no repayment had been required, provided support for that factual finding. Baker v. Baker, 280 Ga. 299, 627 S.E.2d 26 (2006). Question for jury. - Question whether money left with son-in-law was a loan to him or a gift to the daughter is a question of fact for the jury. Crawford v. Manson, 82 Ga. 118, 8 S.E. 54 (1888); Gross v. Higginbotham, 34 Ga. App. 549, 130 S.E. 371 (1925). Presumption of advancement. - Gift of property by a parent to a child after marriage, when the child is living alone, is prima facie an advancement. Holliday v. Wingfield, 59 Ga. 206 (1877). Cited in Webb v. Blake, 31 Ga. App. 101, 119 S.E. 447 (1923); Jackson v. Moultrie Prod. Credit Ass’n, 76 Ga. App. 768, 47 S.E.2d 127 (1948); Paris v. Paris, 207 Ga. 341, 61 S.E.2d 491 (1950).
RESEARCH REFERENCES Am. Jur. 2d. - 38 Am. Jur. 2d, Gifts, § 62. C.J.S. - 38 C.J.S., Gifts, § 91. ALR. - Right of child en ventre sa mere to take under a conveyance or devise of present interest to parent and children, 50 ALR 619. Gift of automobile, 100 ALR2d 1219.
Unexplained gratuitous transfer of property from one relative to another as raising presumption of gift, 94 ALR3d 608. Issuance of stock certificate to joint tenants as creating gift inter vivos, 5 ALR4th 373.