ROTH Spousal Inheritance
I am 73 years old and my wife 67(both retired). During our working years we were not able (due to income levels) to open a ROTH IRA …except one year between career changes….I qualified to open a ROTH for $5K. During the last five years before retiring, my company offered a ROTH 401K in which I contributed exclusively each year. After retiring I rolled over (Trustee to Trustee) the ROTH 401K balance to by ROTH IRA.
In the past three years I have also converted $50K per year from my traditional IRA to the same ROTH IRA.
My question is….will my wife have any problem inheriting this ROTH IRA since she currently has never had a ROTH in her name (only a traditional IRA)
Permalink Submitted by Alan - IRA critic on Wed, 2021-03-24 16:05
It sounds like your first Roth IRA contribution was prior to 2017, and if so your Roth is now qualified including the rollover amount from the Roth 401k. If you wife inherits it, she just needs to make an election of ownership and she will then own the qualified Roth. If a spouse inherits a qualified Roth, it remains qualified.