Rule 19.Lis pendens

Rule 19 imports a civil remedy into family court without restating it.

The provision

In domestic relations actions any party may record a notice of pendency of the proceeding — a lis pendens — under the circumstances and in the manner provided in other civil actions.

What a lis pendens does

It is a notice recorded in the county land records saying that litigation is pending which affects title to a particular parcel. It does not freeze the property or create a lien. What it does is destroy the possibility of a later buyer or lender taking free of the outcome: anyone dealing with the land after the notice is recorded takes subject to whatever the court decides.

Why it matters here

Equitable distribution frequently turns on real property, and a case can run for many months while one spouse holds title alone. Without notice on the record, a sale or a mortgage during that period could put the property beyond the court's practical reach. Rule 19 makes the ordinary civil tool available.

What "any party" and "as in other civil actions" mean

The right is not the plaintiff's alone — any party may record. And the rule deliberately supplies no separate family court standard: both the circumstances in which a notice may be recorded and the manner of recording it are whatever they are in other civil actions. So the requirements, the form and the consequences come from general South Carolina law rather than from this ruleset, and Rule 19's work is to confirm that they reach a domestic case.