Short answer. Possibly yes. Ownership of a thing sold passes to the buyer at the moment of delivery, not at the moment a deed is signed. Delivery can be actual, such as physical handover, or it can happen in any other manner that shows both parties agreed possession had shifted from seller to buyer, including being let onto the property as owner.

What the law says

The ownership of the thing sold is acquired by the vendee from the moment it is delivered to him in any of the ways specified in articles 1497 to 1501, or in any other manner signifying an agreement that the possession is transferred from the vendor to the vendee.

Civil Code, Article 1496 — How Ownership Is Acquired by the Vendee. Read the full provision →

Delivery, not the deed, transfers ownership

Under Article 1496, ownership of a thing sold passes to the buyer from the moment it is delivered, whether that delivery happens through one of the specific methods the Civil Code describes or through any other manner that signifies an agreement that possession has moved from the seller to the buyer. A notarized deed of sale is important evidence, and it is usually required to register the transfer with the Registry of Deeds, but the deed itself is not what makes you the owner as between you and the seller. The controlling event is delivery of the thing, and the parties' conduct can supply that delivery even without paperwork.

What counts as delivery

Article 1497 describes actual delivery as the thing sold being placed in the control and possession of the buyer. That does not necessarily require a formal handover ceremony or the physical passing of keys; what matters is whether the buyer was actually given the ability to control and possess the property. If the seller allowed you onto the property, let you use it, and treated you as the one in charge of it, that pattern of conduct can itself be the delivery the law is looking for, separate from any document recording the sale.

Acting as owner from day one

Being let in to act as owner from day one is exactly the kind of fact Article 1496 is written to cover, since it looks at what the parties actually did rather than only at what they signed. If the seller's conduct, over time, showed a clear agreement that you were the one in possession and control, that can amount to delivery in the broader sense the article allows, even without a deed or a literal handover of keys. Whether it does depends heavily on the specific facts of how the seller treated you.

Why a written deed still matters

None of this means a deed is pointless. A deed of sale is what you present to transfer title in the Registry of Deeds and to protect your ownership against later buyers or claims from third parties, and without one you may struggle to prove the sale ever happened at all. Ownership as between you and the seller can rest on delivery alone, but establishing that delivery occurred, and on what terms, is far easier with a signed document than with conduct someone else can later dispute or deny.

Cases citing this provision

These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.

Related provisions

Note. Statute text quoted on this page is reproduced from the official enactment and is linked to the full provision. The explanation around it is general legal information from Vivas & Nobles Law Office, not legal advice. Whether it applies to your situation depends on facts only a lawyer reviewing them can assess.