HOTCHPOT

hotchpot (hoch-pot), n.1. The blending of items of property to secure equality of division, esp. as practiced either in cases of divorce or in cases in which advancements of an intestate’s property must be made up to the estate by a contribution or by an accounting. — Also termed hotchpotch; hotchpot rule. Cf. RAPPORT à SUCCESSION. [Cases: Descent and Distribution  108; Wills  757, 762. C.J.S. Descent and Distribution § 106; Wills §§ 1774–1776, 1789.]

“In some states … a child who has received his advancement in real or personal estate, may elect to throw the amount of the advancement into the common stock, and take his share of the estate descended, or his distributive share of the personal estate, as the case may be: and this is said to be bringing the advancement into hotchpot, and it is a proceeding which resembles the collatio bonorum in the civil law.” 4 James Kent, Commentaries on American Law *419 (George Comstock ed., 11th ed. 1866).

“[T]he distribution of the property among the children is subject to what is called the hotchpot rule, the purpose of which is to ensure that the shares of all the children shall be equal. The rule is that any money or property which the intestate has paid to, or settled on, or covenanted to settle on a child, either by way of advancement or in view of marriage, shall be brought into account and deducted from the share which is payable to that child under the intestacy.” G.C. Cheshire, Modern Law of Real Property 783–84 (3d ed. 1933).

2. In a community-property state, the property that falls within the community estate. See COLLATIO BONORUM. [Cases: Husband and Wife  248.5–260.] 3.MAIN POT.

[Blacks Law 8th]