Estate a beneficiary of IRA

Husband dies and, unfortunately, had his estate as the beneficiary of his traditional IRA. The will leaves everything to his surviving spouse. Is there ANY WAY the spouse can rollover the IRA proceeds to her IRA? (Custodian has said that they will only cut check to the estate.I am thinking that MAYBE she could roll the IRA amount over within 60 days.



There have been several PLRs that allow the surviving spouse to roll the proceeds over in this situation, but if she is not the executor of the estate, she will have to ask that the executor delays the IRA distribution to the estate until it can be released to the spouse within 60 days of distribution to meet the rollover deadline. The surviving spouse would just report the contribution to her IRA as a rollover contribution. She cannot roll over any portion of her husband’s year of death RMD that had not been completed.

Most helpful! The surviving spouse is the executor of the estate, so the proper timing should not be a problem. Thanks for your input!

See my article on this subject in the October 1997 issue of Estate Planning:  http://www.kkwc.com/docs/AR20050125164755.pdf.

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