IRA spouse Beneficiary

I am sole beneficiary of my wife’s traditional IRA she was 79 at death Nov. 2020 and had been taking RMDS I am 88 .what are my options. I would like to keep RMDS as low as possible.



Your best option is to elect to assume ownership of the inherited IRA as you can then use the lower Uniform Table for your RMDs. And if you did not take the full beneficiary RMD for 2021 based on HER younger age, then you have become the owner by default and that would have reduced your RMD for 2021. But you should still advise the custodian that you are assuming ownership of the IRA. They will retitle it in your name. If you will still be 88 at the end of 2022, your RMD divisor for 2022 will be 13.7. It’s not clear whether you fell short in 2021 or not.

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